It has been a remarkable achievement from the family-oriented team: Cole and husband
Brendon, daughters Ella and Georgia, supported by dedicated staff.
It is remarkable considering five weeks of the season was lost during the Covid-19 racing
shutdown. The lockdown obviously meant lost stake earning opportunities, especially given the suspension of all group and feature races since March.
"We were flying when we stopped racing. During the shutdown we marked time with our
dogs, which put back the younger ones we were bringing up when we restarted racing.
The thousand was a goal we had set for ourselves – we'll have to target that next season,"
Brendon Cole said.
The Cole training machine is likely to relentlessly march on during this evening's meeting.
The club has moved their open class races back to the later part in the programme this evening after having opened recent meetings with the top-ranked events.
The 305m open class sprinters opens up the late Quaddie (race 9), where the entire field
is provided by Cole.
The draw suggests the inside-drawn trio of Big Time Fairy, Sir Duggie and the 305m winner from the last two Friday's Big Time Jonie are likely to feature predominantly, although Big Time Angel also holds claims from her wider draw after having recently lowered the Manawatū 410m track record.
The gun 520m chasers are next up and Big Time Maple, Big Time Kobe and Big Time
Baby bring solid-looking form to the event.
Bigtime Brody is a much better chaser than his current form line indicates, while the
claim held by the trap-one drawn Big Time Izzy cannot be lightly dismissed.
