THE name Yaya's Hot Spot will live in local harness racing folklore for many years to come, after the four-year-old smashed the clock in winning the TAB Karloo Mick Gratuity (1720m) on Sunday's Carnival of Cups meeting at Dubbo Paceway.
Prepared by leading trainer Shane Tritton and driven by Lauren Panella, the Jereme's Jet (USA) x Star Of Heaven (NZ) gelding started a prohibitive $1.10 favourite and gave nothing else a chance as he beat My Dusky Sound ($19.60, Amanda Turnbull) by more than 25 metres, with Mister Chow ($7.60, Ashlee Siejka) a further four metres away in third place.
But as impressive as the winning margin was, it was nothing compared to the times shown on the semaphore board.
Yaya's Hot Spot ran an even lead time of 8.0s to find the lead and strolled through the first quarter of the last mile in a leisurely 30.1s. Panella asked the gelding to gradually pick up the pace from that point, with the middle splits run in 29.6s and 28.7s respectively. It was at this stage when race caller Craig Easey sensed something special was on the cards and all focus turned to the clock.
With the race result beyond doubt as Yaya's Hot Spot put a gap in his rivals, the biggest interest was in the time, and despite not being fully tested by Panella down the straight the gelding still recorded a split of 27.1s for his final 400m.
It all added up to an overall time of 2:03.5, which equated to a mile rate of 1:55.5, slashing almost two seconds off Slick Bromac's previous mark of 1:57.4 recorded in December 2011. It was fitting that the time was registered in a race named after Karloo Mick, arguably the greatest racing animal Dubbo has ever produced.
"That felt pretty good," Panella said after the race.
"I knew we were running pretty good time out there. We didn't go that hard early but he's such a fast horse that once we started rolling I knew he was going to run some pretty slick sectionals.
"He loves these smaller 800m tracks too. He seems to really slingshot off the corners so he really got conditions to suit today.
"In the truck on the way here we thought we might be able to give the track record a shake but to beat it by that much shows just how good this horse is going at the moment."
For Tritton, the win was exactly what he wanted to see as he plots a course to this year's Inter Dominion series in Perth, where the 800m Gloucester Park circuit is expected to suit the four-year-old. But first he will make the trek to Melbourne this week for the $50,000 University Foods 4/5yo Championship (2240m) at Melton.
"We've been waiting to get him over a mile on one of these smaller tracks," Tritton said.
"A couple of runs back it took a champion like Smolda to beat him in the Renshaw Cup at Penrith and now he has come out and run that sort of time here it just fills me with confidence that we can take him to Perth and he will acquit himself well.
"I've had him since he was a two-year-old and he's always been a really nice horse but I probably lost him a bit late in his three-year-old season.
"But we've got him back to the level we know he is capable of. He's probably the most exciting horse in my stable and today the people of Dubbo saw why."
by Ben Walker courtesy of Dubbo's Daily Liberal