There was one heart stopping incident in the mid seventies which could have halted Dean Chapple’s love affair with harness racing before it got off the ground.
There’s nothing I’ve enjoyed more over the years than the many conversations I’ve had with veteran horsemen - especially harness horsemen who were around in the days when the sport was drawing big crowds all around Australia.
You’ll be hard pressed to find a horseman who isn’t enamoured of the sight of a talented trotter in full flight. Power Productions have kindly allowed me access to a video production highlighting the poetry of the trotting horse and the devotion of those who train them.
Wayne Dimech was in his mid-teens when Hondo Grattan was dominating the harness racing headlines in the early 1970’s. He had obviously inherited the harness racing genes from his Maltese forebears.
Australian harness racing currently boasts a plethora of talented drivers in the 20-25 age bracket. Those who appear regularly on metropolitan tracks enjoy the bulk of available media attention.
Trainers lucky enough to have a runner at a major trots meeting are conscious of the atmosphere only big time racing can generate. Miracle Mile night is something else again.
There’s no better pointer for punters than a Darren Hancock trained horse turning up at Penrith. The leading horseman has been an unabashed fan of the 1400m Menangle circuit since its inception in 2008
The 2022 Penrith racing year concluded on December 29th with what looked to be a run of the mill programme on paper. It took a rare training double by father and daughter duo David and Katie McGill, to inject a little “buzz” into the night.
A certain ninetieth birthday passed by quietly a few months ago without the bells and whistles it warranted. Harry Pearce, the elder statesman of Australian trots journalism much preferred a quiet gathering with his wife Barbara and the three generations for which they’re responsible…
In the days when I was getting to the trots on a regular basis, Amy Day was one of my favourite people. The petite blonde daughter of Neil and Vicki Day was at the mercy of genetic forces from the time of her birth thirty two years ago.
Laurence Dawson is one of many young horsemen who’ve worked hard to carve themselves a niche in harness racing rather than turn their backs on a sport they’ve grown to love.
We’d like to share with you a snappy HRNSW promotional video featuring the highlights of the sport in the first half of the current season. This video was produced by Power Productions.
David Brown is one of several trainers alarmed by recent rumblings about the future of the Penrith Paceway. The regular Thursday night meetings are the lifeblood of those trainers who work day jobs.
Stephen Conroy has never forgotten the moment he realised just how much harness racing meant to him. It was a regular Friday night meeting at Harold Park in the mid 1980’s and he’d just won a trophy race with his consistent gelding Saint Albans.
Bill Hansell’s career in harness racing had just begun when the dual Academy Award winning movie “The Quiet Man” was released in 1952. The title of the famous John Wayne classic best describes the persona of Bill Hansell.
