Mattie excited by untapped speedster

Mattie Craven has labelled Bettor Isolate (Bettors Delight) one of the more exciting horses ever to set foot in his stables and is looking ahead to big feature harness racing goals with the explosive five-year-old pacer.

The son of Bettors Delight perhaps turned more heads in defeat than winner Hurricane Harley did with victory on Saturday night at Melton, with Craven’s charge ripping out insane closing fractions when third in the Lazarus Free For All.

From back in the field, he clocked a personal final 400m split of 25.38sec, with his last 800m raced in 53.80sec.

“He’s pretty cool to drive,” the trainer-driver said. “He’s just got that electric speed.

“He’s a funny little character. I don’t necessarily get along with him that well… Wayne Ross, who works for me and is one of the owners, he just treats him like his little kid and loves him to death.

“They seem to get along like a house on fire, so I let him do most of the work with him.”

Craven and his partner Amy Day are expecting their first child in the coming weeks, meaning a trek to this year’s Queensland winter carnival is out of the question for the Ecklin South horseman.

And while he is still considering sending the horse north, Craven is more inclined to wait and chase other targets later in the year.

“Everything is always on the table… I’m just a little bit mindful that all the way through we don’t get too many runs into his prep,” he said.

“If we were to go to Queensland, we probably can’t afford to give him too many runs.

“I’d like to get a little bit of racing together just to try and help season him.

“The Queensland carnival looks really strong and I wouldn’t be able to go – not that that would really matter – but I’m probably leaning more towards waiting.

“If he really put his hand up and said ‘take me to the Sunshine Sprint’ I might send him, but I’m more leaning towards waiting and seeing if I can set him for a Len Smith Mile (at Menangle) or something like that.”

Bettor Isolate tackled last year’s Queensland carnival, winning the Rising Sun Consolation and JC McMullen during a two-start campaign in that state.

He then won a heat and final of the NSW Breeders Challenge at Menangle in October before spelling until tackling the Riverina Championships at Wagga, where he took out a qualifier and then finished a close-up third in the final on April 8.

Then came the slashing performance on free-for-all debut on Saturday night, with that effort taking his career record to nine wins and three placings from 19 starts.

“If he didn’t fail that start at Melton (June 4, 2022) when he ended up being sick, he would have found himself in a Rising Sun I reckon. And I would like to have thought he wouldn’t have been far behind Ladies In Red, especially the way he raced,” Craven said.

“There’s a good race in him somewhere, it’s just being able to season him, race him against these good horses and try to look after him. When the right race and right run turns up, I’m sure he’s more than capable.”

by Tim O’Connor, for Harness Racing Victoria