 | RACING HISTORY |
YEAR: 2002
FEATURE RACE COMMENT
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Has David Butcher ever driven better? Regardless of whether he has or not, he can claim to be in superb form.
After driving 33-to-one shot Purr Along to victory at Alexandra Park on Thursday night, he was a Addington the next night, to settle a score with Disprove. The son of Camelon had raced without luck on either of the first two days at the Cup Meeting.
Again Butcher found him in fine fettle. He was quite relaxed about sitting in the open over the last lap of the SBS Banking Like It Should Be/ Heller Smallgoods Free-For-All, and he responded generously in the straight to win by two lengths from Mister D G, with a tiring Stars And Stripes all-out to hold third from Eastwood Jaunty.
Possibly in the best form of his career just now, and with an obvious liking for he big Addington track, Disprove went a super time for the 2600m mobile, taking 3:10.7. His programme now includes the Auckland Cup meeting, which trainer Nicky Chilcott is doing with some reluctance. "He is so much better going this way round, but what can you do? We can't really be sitting at home with a horse like him when that is going on," she said.
Chilcott again said how touch and go it was to have Disprove at the meeting. "I panicked early on. I was really worried about him. To be honest, I really wasn't that keen on coming south," she said. She chanced her arm on the environment at David and Catherine Butt's where she thought the beach work would be the tonic he needed. "Back home, he walks in the water, and that is about it," she said.
While the Auckland carnival is on the agenda, and that is about all, Melbourne is a firm one. "The Hunter Cup and the Victoria Cup are definitely on for us," said the pacer's part-owner, Wellington real estate agent Louis Newman, who races the horse with taxi driver Tony Jack and Lyn Jacobsen.
"They have had a lot of trouble with him, and twice he nearly died," said Newman. "Nicky has been superb with him, and David has given a lot of advice as well," he said. Newman was generous in his praise for Peter Jones, who gave the horse one race "then advised us to have him trained up north."
"It was just luck that I stumbled on him," said Chilcott.
Credit: Mike Grainger writing in HRWeekly 27Nov02