Lardner Lou wins Woolamai Cup

BORN This Way may not have made it three in a row for trainer Cliff Murray but it was equally thrilling for him with his wife Michelle Murray training the Woolamai Cup winner Lardner Lou.
Cliff happens to also be a part-owner of the horse which is named after a good friend of the Murray’s, Lou Pratt of Lardner, who is a part-owner. Mrs Pratt was there to see the horse cross the line.
Woolamai was at its picture-postcard best on Saturday with one of the biggest crowds of the year turning out for the running of the time-honoured Woolamai Cup. In warm conditions, picnic racegoers were treated to another fantastic afternoon of entertainment on both sides of the running rail. It was yet another feather in the cap for the Woolamai Racing Club who consistently draw huge crowds, meeting after meeting; season after season.
In the feature event of the day, the Woolamai Cup, a capacity field of ten runners took to the track with punters facing the daunting task of picking a winner from one of the best Cup line-ups of the season. In a truly-run race, Tearaway Tommy took up its customary front-running role and, turning for home, looked every bit the winner.
But in a tremendous finish, $13-shot Lardner Lou, ridden superbly by Grant Seacombe, snatched the Cup out of Tommy’s grasp, gliding to victory within sight of the finish line to upstage her more fancied rivals by three-quarters of a length. It was the five-year-old mare’s second career win, delighting both trainer Michelle Murray and, in an unfortunate side-effect, a ring of nauseatingly jubilant bookmakers. Previous winner the last two years Born this Way finished fifth.
Race club secretary Bev Carmichael said the fields were really good, the racing spectacular and everyone had a good day.
“The fashions were good too and quite a few men dressed up in colourful suits.”
All marquees were booked out and quite a number of “buck’s parties” swelled the crowd numbers.
Jockey Matthew Corbisiero got his day off to a fine start riding the first two winners, Wright Opinion and Rustana.
Grant Seacombe also scored a double, winning races three and four, including the Woolamai Cup winner.
Woolamai has two more meetings left; Saturday, February 21 and Saturday, March 14.

We did it: winning horse Lardner Lou is pictured with trainer Michelle Murray, left, jockey Grant Seacombe, and fourth from left Lou Pratt, who the horse is named after.

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Posted by Sarah Vella on Feb 11 2015. Filed under Sport. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry