Ken Casellas | Photo: Hamilton Content Creators
There are many and varied obstacles that transpire to thwart pacers from winning. One of the most unusual was the fierce headwind that was blowing up the home straight at Gloucester Park on Friday night.
It took every ounce of talent and determination from brilliant four-year-old Finvarra to stretch every sinew to get up and snatch victory from the pacemaker Arma Einstein in the 2130m Aaron Bain Racing Pace.
Maddison Brown kicked away with $3.50 second fancy Arma Einstein on the home turn to make life difficult for the $1.40 favourite Finvarra, who had worked in the breeze in the six-horse field.
“The breeze is a hard place to race on any night, but tonight to do that especially with the headwind howling up the home straight,” said star reinsman Gary Hall Jnr.
“I didn’t think that Finvarra was going to get there. I thought that I had let Maddy get away with too much, and when she kicked away on the bend, I thought that Arma Einstein had done enough to hold me out.”
However, Finvarra responded grandly to Hall’s urgings, and he got up in the final couple of strides to beat Arma Einstein by a half-neck after an excellent final 400m in 27.4sec.
“Finvarra hung a bit on the bend, so I tried to get a bit of a break, which I managed to,” said Brown. “But it wasn’t quite enough.”
Hall said that competing in small fields was not easy. “Small fields are difficulty, and horrible at times, unless you’re on the leader, he said. “They don’t usually go hard early, and then you (in the breeze) have one on your back that can go fast.
“The Golden Nugget is the main aim for Finvarra, but he is a bit immature to be a Cups horse yet. I don’t think he is far behind Jumpingjackmac.”
Finvarra, trained by Gary Hall Snr, has been remarkably consistent, with ten wins and eight placings from 19 starts for earnings of $175,873.