 | RACING HISTORY |
YEAR: 2010
FEATURE RACE COMMENT
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Something very rare happened at Addington on Saturday.
Stylish Monarch won - and paid double figures. This is the horse that usually lines up showing around the $2 mark, thanks to a super-consistent career where he has finished further back than third only 5 times in 21 starts.
Saturday was the son of Monarchy's first real test in the 'big time', and that combined with a tricky second-row draw saw him overlooked in pre-race calculations. After a gem of a drive from Ricky May though, the 6-year-old punched home best to win the $40,000 United Fisheries Ltd Trotting Free-For-All.
"Most of the time he's pretty lazy during the prelim, but today he was really onto it," an impressed May said afterwards. "And usually the good ones have got something wrong with them or some little quirk, but he's foolproof. He's a really nice horse."
It was a stellar moment for Stylish Monarch's trainer Murray Tapper too, winning the biggest race of his training career. "He's the best I've trained, for certain," Tapper said. "And I've had some nice horses before, but nothing like him."
Stylish Monarch is making a habit of taking his owner Anne Patterson and trainer to new heights..he was the first horse to win when the new stabling facility at Addington was opened last May, he won Tapper a race on Cup Day in November, and now he has got a Free-For-All which contained a few prized scalps to his name.
Things aren't going to stop there though, because Tapper's convinced that Stylish Monarch's ready to target one of the biggest cherries of them all - May's Rowe Cup in Auckland. "I've never taken one out of the South Island, I normally head south," Tapper said with a smile. "But he's just a real professional horse. He's got a 'couldn't care less' attitude and the all-round game. He's the sort of horse you dream of, really."
There is one trait that Tapper wishes his star trotter didn't have though, and that is an extreme love of water. "Him and his mate Domination are buggers for playing in it," he says. "You'll go out to the paddock, and if there's any water to be found - sure enough, they'll be splashing around in it. I don't have concrete troughs any more because he has already smashed a couple of those, and he puts his foot right through the plastic ones. So you've just got to be really careful and keep an eye on them."
That responsibility will be David Gaffaney's for the next wee while, as Tapper says he is going to leave Stylish Monarch with the Rangiora horseman for now. "David's going to jog him around the roads and take him to the beach. He will probably have another couple of runs before heading north, and I'd like him to have one or two up there before the Rowe Cup too."
Credit: John Robinson writing in HRWeekly 10Feb10