McCarthy ready for a big night

It’s hard to believe that champion harness racing reinsman Luke McCarthy has landed just 19 winners this season.

After all, the 40-year-old sits comfortably among the best reinsmen this country has produced in a career that has produced 2877 winners and an incredible 76 Group 1 wins.

And bear in mind McCarthy has landed more than 100 winners in 19 of the past 22 seasons.

Yet the Cobbitty reinsman also has a busy breeding barn, Cobbitty Equine Farm that he and his wife Belinda have turned into a raging success, boasting stallions such as Bling It On, Capt Midnight, For A Reason, Huntsville, Jilliby Kung Fu, King Of Swing, McWicked and Ultimate Machete.

And these days McCarthy is quite content to hand at least half of his regular drives to up-and-coming young driver Jack Callaghan, who already has more than 500 wins to his credit at the age of 21.

Callaghan acts as stable foreman for Luke and Belinda and this weekend has been campaigning in Perth with Miracle Mile runner-up Spirit Of St Louis.

That leaves the way clear for Luke to have a big night at Menangle and he’ll handle favourites in four of the eight races, along with two other horses likely to be well-backed.

Probably the best of Luke’s chances comes up in Race 2 with the well-performed gelding Kingmaker, who returned to his best with a 1:52.2 win at Menangle two weeks ago.

Listed a $2.50 chance in early markets, Kingmaker is perfectly drawn in gate five to use his gate speed and take up the running over tonight’s 1609m journey and looks one of the safest bets on the program.

Luke then gets his first race drive on well-performed former Victorian mare Just As Well, having her fourth run for the stable but already a winner with Jack Brown and Cameron Hart aboard.

This mare has already shown good gate speed in previous runs and despite an awkward draw, has been listed a $2.75 favourite to make it a hat-trick of wins for the stable.

Don’t be surprised if Luke is then chasing his third win in successive races when he climbs into the sulky behind another stable newcomer, Three Rivers, who has joined the team from Darrel Graham’s Queensland barn.

Three Rivers scored an easy win first-up for the stable and has already won three from four this season.

Luke’s other favoured drive is aboard outstanding mare Fairy Tinkabell ($2.25) in Race 7.

For complete race entries, click here.

by Michael Court, for Harness Racing New South Wales