 | RACING HISTORY |
YEAR: 2011
FEATURE RACE COMMENT
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"Dad, do you really want a trotter?"
"Yes, Michelle," he said to his daughter. "I want to buy a trotter before I give up."
Jim McDonald was 80 then, and along with his grand-daughter Olivia, did a search of the PGG Wrightson catalogue a year ago to find one he liked. He settled on a filly by CR Commando from In De Fence, a mare by Sundon and paid Invercargill's Don McRae $15,500 for her.
"I didn't see her before she came into the ring, and then got Matt Bowden to break her in before I gave her to Mark Jones. It wasn't long before Mark got back to me and said we had something worthwhile."
The filly had won two of her five starts and with experience, speed and manners, she easily found the front in the Group 3 Dream With Me Stables NZ Trotter's Trust NZ Trotting Oaks at Addington last Saturday. It was a lead that Brookside Filly couldn't put a dent in, with Brawlinwiththe boyz showing her old spark but beaten into third by more than four lengths.
While Commander Jewel is the first trotter McDonald has raced, its not the first he's owned; that was the smart mare Racey Tracey. "But I put her in foal to Sundon and lost her and the foal," he recalled.
Commander Jewel has won just short of $25,000 and has joined the chasing bunch behind Paramount Geegee in the 3-year-old Ruby of the Harness Jewels.
Credit: Mike Grainger writing in HRWeekly 18 May 2011