Last Saturday night was the night of a lifetime for horse breakers and trainers, Wayne and Lyn Graham. Within the space of 25 minutes, the popular Queensland couple snared their biggest double during their long and decorated careers in harness racing after claiming the Gr.1 $322,000 Australian Pacing Gold Fillies Final at TABCORP Park, Menangle plus the $80,000 Albion Park Gold Final.
Park Life, handled by their son Shane,(currently Australia’s Champion Driver), claimed the Sydney classic while seriously in-form reinsman Adam Sanderson handled Jossie James in the home state feature.
The respected couple have been a regular fixture in Brisbane harness racing circles for decades and have enjoyed tremendous success with such stars like Sparkling Melody, Mach Alert, Yahoo Buckaroo, Lively Highlander, Bossys Henry, Power In Disguise, Innocent Nero, Rapt In Red, French Heiress and Albert Aralar among others at Moomba Lodge, their property at Beaudesert. Their current team is headed by exciting four-year-old Major Coup, a last start winner of the QBRED Breeders Classic Final at Albion Park plus this pair of precocious fillies.
Wayne, who broke in his first horse at the tender age of 14 said that, at full capacity he and Lyn would put through 60/70 yearlings a year and, in the course of the first stage of education, would form an opinion of each and every one of them. They most certainly do not all develop into top liners, and, as the old saying goes, “you have to go through a 100 to find that “good one”. The downside of what can be a reasonably sound ‘living” is ,that when you unearth the four legged “city of pure gold”, it usually won’t be staying around for the breaker to get his name in lights. Off the little graduates go to a racing stable, where the fortunate trainer and or driver gets the glory and the prizemoney percentages. Astrology is an interesting science and we would like to know exactly what planet was aligned with what and who was in what house the day that Park Life and Jossie James rocked up to Moomba Lodge. The signs were all auspicious with the owners electing to leave the fillies in training where they first learnt their trade. The net result was a “double whammy” of awesome proportions. It made 40 plus years of hard slog seem very worthwhile indeed.
D Smith
Approved By Dean Baring www.harnessbred.com
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