15 October 2019 | AMY REES
IT was a night of race-to-race doubles at Bathurst Paceway on Friday night with six of the eight races being taken out by the same three trainers and drivers.
Trainer Trevor Munday kicked the trend off in race three, when Sky Diamond NZ led all the way to score by a comfortable 10 metre margin with driver Cameron Hart in the sulky.
The Munday-Hart combination made it worth the trip when Mustang Milly saluted the judge in the following event, again leading all the way.
Race five was the feature of the night – the Bathurst Shootout, and was taken out by the Steve Turnbull trained Maximus Red for driver Amanda Turnbull.
Coming off a track record win five days earlier at Eugowra, the $1.50 favourite found the front early where he proved too strong for rivals.
The father-daughter combination struck again in race six with kiwi pacer Rock On NZ.
Only the mare’s second Australian start, she gave her rivals something to chase scoring by a 15 metre margin in a 1:57:3 mile-rate.
The final two events on the card were taken out by the Ashlee Grives trained and driven Valiente and Allegretto.
Valiente looked to be in a little trouble when the four-year-old gelding landed three back the marker pegs in the small seven-horse field.
However, able to make good use of the sprint-lane, the pair were able to pull through for favourite backers scoring by five metres.
There was never a doubt for Allegretto in the last though, with the full brother to Group 1 winning mare Ameretto proving too classy for his rivals.
Of the rest, Bernie and Doug Hewitt combined to win the first on the card with four-year-old gelding Lord Denzel and the Peter Bullock-Mckayler Barnes combination fought off rivals in the second to score at big odds.
Barnes was awarded the ‘drive of the night’ by Fred Hastings for her drive on gelding Enk Spot Shannon.
Approved By Dean Baring www.harnessbred.com
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