De Campo trains $100,000 Group 1 trifecta

To win a Group 1 is a feat many in harness racing aspire to but to train the trifecta in a race of that tier is what dreams are made of.

That is what West Australian harness racing trainer Aiden De Campo achieved at Gloucester Park tonight.

The 29-year-old trained the first three placegetters in the $100,000 Group 1 Two-Year-Old Pearl Classic (2130m).

De Campo’s pacer The Miki Taker lived up to his favourtism to win the feature with Dylan Egerton-Green in the sulk, while Floewriter and driver Gary Hall Jnr were second and Rock On Top and De Campo held third place.

Floewriter was driven forward by Hall to hold the lead and in that time Egerton-Green worked The Miki Taker three wide and then outside the leader.

Rock On Top was positioned in the running line towards the back of the field and with a lead time of 36.4 seconds, the tempo was slightly eased with the first quarter run in 31.6 seconds.

That did not last for too long as the pace was put on with the final three quarters run in 30.6, 28.3 and 28.9 seconds.

The Miki Taker dug deep to win by more than four metres over Floewriter while Rock On Top did not get a clear run until well into the home straight and finished off strongly to only be beaten seven-and-a-half metres in a mile rate of 1:57.7. Watch the replay here.

This Egerton-Green’s first success in the Pearl Classic as it was De Campo’s first training success in the feature.

De Campo won the race as a driver in 2015 with Rich Yankee.

This victory took Egerton-Green’s total wins to 680 and has given De Campo 163 winners as a trainer.

As for The Miki Taker, that was his second win in four starts.

He is gelded son of Always B Miki out of the Art Major mare Topless Beach Girl and was bred by Sharron and Mike Howie who also bred Floewriter, a Sportswriter colt out of the Lombo Mandingo mare Maddy White.

Meanwhile, also at Gloucester Park tonight, talented three-year-old Lavra Joe was brave when taking on the older horses and finished second-placed to To Fast To Serious.

Also Mighty Conqueror produced a tough effort to claim the open race on the card to defeat Patronus Star and an unlucky Chicago Bull.

To see all of tonight’s results from Gloucester Park, click here.

By Amanda Rando for Harnesslink