TALENTED trainer-driver Melissa Maine doesn’t get too many opportunities to display her prowess in the sulky but she made the most of it at Tattersall’s Park in Hobart last Sunday night.
Maine partnered Kept Calm to a game all-the-way win in the Coal Valley Spraying services Mobile Pace over 2090 metres for what was the gelding’s first win of the season from 17 outings.
Kept Calm showed good early speed to hold the lead from the pole position and once in front Maine rated the six-year-old superbly.
When the challengers emerged on the home turn Maine never panicked and held her charge together, waiting for the right moment to call for the supreme effort.
Kept Calm, prepared at Devonport by Adam Emery, was clearly headed at the top of the straight but he found plenty when Maine released the brakes and went on to score by a half-metre from Loaded To Run with El jays Maverick two metres astern.
“I knew how much we had left and it was just a matter of waiting for the right moment to let him go and that’s how it panned out,” Maine said.
“We got away with a cheap quarter and the challengers were hard at it so I just had to hope my horse could lift that extra bit and he did,” she said.
Maine usually only drives her own horses but was given the opportunity by Emery who usually has his wife Natalee in the cart.
Natalee Emery was already booked to drive Coal Creek and given Maine had driven kept Calm at his previous outing and handled him well, the trainer opted not to break up the partnership.
Maine has five of her own horses in work which is more than enough to keep her busy on a part-time basis.