In Brief
- Mare too good in L.H.T Cup Prelude.
- Hillier double.
- Trotters break state record.
Four-year-old mare Blame It On Me ($6.00) stamped herself as a strong contender for Sunday weeks Light Harness Cup Final after scoring in Friday night’s Prelude.
Driver Natalee Emery positioned the Doug Nettlefold mare one-out and five-back in the 14-horse field before gaining a three-wide cart up over the final circuit.
The mare swept to the lead at the top of the home straight and was too good late for Jocund ($26), and Earl Jujon ($4.40 fav) in a mile rate of 2m 1.7s, off the winner’s handicap of 20 metres in the 2579-metre event.
The win was the Big Jim mares 11th career victory.
The $12,000 Final of the L.H.T Cup will be held on 25 April.
Missin Rock was another four-year-old mare to score at the meeting in a 50 to 59 rated event restricted to fillies and mares over the mile trip.
Sent out as a $6.00 chance, the Eric Jacobson-trained mare settled one-out and two-back from her second-row draw and was too quick for her rivals late to score by a half-neck in 1m 59.2s, which was the first time the Sam Gangell driven pacer has broken the 2m 0.0s in her four wins.
Eye See Double (Rohan Hillier) winning the first race on the Hobart card.
Rohan Hillier was the in-form driver of the meeting with a double on the card.
He scored on the Ivan Belbin-trained Eye See Double, who led to win the opening race as the $2.15 favourite.
Hillier’s other winner came in the last race with Mascott ($6.00), who broke the state record for trotters when recording 2m 0.6s for the mile trip after leading all the way.
Rodney Ashwood prepares the trotter.
Ben Woodsford is currently on a stewards enforced break from the sulky, but he was in the winner’s list with his eight-year-old mare Metro Star ($4.80 fav), who was well driven by Dylan Ford, who showed incentive to make the most of a very slow early tempo to catch the leaders napping and find the lead at 1200-metre mark.
It wouldn’t be a Tasmanian harness meeting without the nations leading trainer Ben Yole chalking up a winner, and that came in the way of My Ultimate Major, who was the longest price winner of the six-race card at $10.
Watch Mascott became the fastest trotter in Tasmania when winning the Aldebaran Park Trot.