Luzumova ‘privileged’ with maiden G1 starter in NZ Trotting Oaks

Harness racing trainers the world over are in constant pursuit of a pacer or trotter capable of racing at the elite level, but as we all know, expectations versus the harsh reality is quite a humbling experience.

In a career where one must brave the elements, long hours and a tiresome workload, training horses is not for the faint-hearted and finding a horse to make the early starts worthwhile can be a journey in itself.

Oamaru horsewoman, Petra Luzumova, a native of the Czech Republic and relative newbie to the training caper has no such problem at the moment.

Luzumova has hit the ground running since becoming a licenseholder in 2018 with a boutique but above average team of trotters in her care, making the early mornings that much easier.

“I have been very lucky and it absolutely makes a difference having a nice team around you,” laughed Luzumova when quizzed about her recent success.

Streaming Live, a four win daughter of Muscle Mass thrust Luzumova into the spotlight last season when winning four times in five starts, earning herself a start in the inaugural G2 Trotting Mares Handicap at Addington Raceway where she finished ninth.

It was her first taste of the bright lights and almost a year on, Luzumova will go a step further and realise the dream of lining up her first Group One starter when High Intensity, a half sister to Streaming Live, contests the $110,000 New Zealand Trotting Oaks at Addington Raceway on Friday night.

Ironically, Luzumova managed to strike gold with the daughter of Creatine without much panning so to speak, with the nuggety filly finding her way to the Oamaru barn somewhat serendipitously.

“It was a very similar scenario to how I acquired Streaming Live,” said Luzumova.

“Alan Clark got High intensity as a weanling and broke her in and did a couple of preps with her before deciding she wasn’t for him. He rung me and asked me if I would like to take her on.

“He liked her but he felt she was going to take time, she was quite a big leggy filly as some of the Creatine stock seem to be. She showed some ability but had a funny gait as a young horse and just needed a lot of miles in the cart and time to be her friend,” she said.

Both Streaming Live and High Intensity were bred by Southland trotting enthusiast, Kevin Schuck, out the seventeen year old Armbro Invasion mare, Streaming Sunbeam.

She was winless in 20 starts as a racemare, but always had the bloodlines to be a top brood being out of A Touch Of Sun, a Simon Roydon half sister to arguably our most influential trotting product in Sundon.

A Touch Of Sun produced four time Group One winner, King Denny (Majestic Son), among her eight individual winners, while another daughter in Brilliant (Andover Hall) is the dam of last years 3YO G2 Sires Stakes winner in Masterly (Love You).

High Intensity clearly has the pedigree on her side and has shown more then enough ability in her five start career to warrant a crack at the big time.

The daughter of Creatine was a winner on debut at Winton back in August, and has been shown to have a clean pair of heels when she brings her manners to race day.

“The training regime of the pair is similar, but this filly has a little bit more of an attitude. When you are in the cart with her you dont really know what she is going to do, where her sister is a kind mare. This girl definitely has a little bit more of fight and spark about her,” said Luzumova.

High Intensity has prepared for tomorrow night’s Group One feature with a solid trial at Ashburton last week where she sat on the back of last seasons 2YO Filly of the Year, High Energy, and without much urging from Sarah O’Reilly was able to run down her New Zealand Oaks rival right at the winning post.

“That was a wee bit unexpected and she did it quite easy to be honest. We are very happy with the draw (2) and she is feeling very well, working good and we just need a bit of luck on the day.

“Her gate speed is a wee bit of an unknown because we have never really asked her to do it. At Kaikoura it was unfortunate because the horse in front of her galloped and she lost about a length which meant Ricky had to go back with her. It will be interesting to see whether she can get off the gate and cross the inside horse, we will have to wait and see,” she said.

Tomorrow night marks the second occasion in which the New Zealand Trotting Oaks will be run at Group One level, and has drawn an awesome field of trotting fillies which seems to be a deepening pool of talent thanks to the increasing opportunities and unquestionably the change of birthdates has played its role in allowing them time to develop.

“Its huge and probably hasn’t really sunk in yet, but I see it as a huge privilege to even have one good enough to start in a race like the New Zealand Trotting Oaks,” said Luzumova.

“We have got a few of the owners coming to Addington and they are just absolutely stoked really. I think I am going to be so nervous and like I said hasn’t really sunk in. Tomorrow, it will probably be a case of what am I doing here,” she laughed.

Traversing half way around the world to New Zealand from Eastern Europe probably posed a similar question about what Luzumova was doing here, but a love of horses and a budding romance set her on her current path and one she appears to be relishing.

“The horses have always been part of my life, but the harness racing only really happened since coming to New Zealand over ten years ago when I met my partner Billy Heads who has a strong association with the industry and I fell in love with the sport, especially the trotters.

“They have harness racing back home, but its on a very small scale. I have attended some of the meetings but it looks to me like some of the racing there equates to what would be more or less trials over here. The better horses will travel within Europe and race for good money, but they are few and far between,” she said.

In a weird twist of fate, after leaving Europe for which many would claim to be the mecca of the trotting gait, Luzumova has wound up in North Otago working her team out of the Oamaru Racecourse, which given some of it’s inhabitants can easily be considered one of New Zealand’s trotting strongholds.

“The Williamson’s are great. I do sometimes work with Matty Williamson, if he is fast-working I will occasionally follow him around and he is definitely a huge help with advice and even just having somebody to work my team with. Otherwise I do mist of my work myself, I have an owner in High Intensity who comes and helps me out a lot and will drive the galloping pacemaker and things like that,” she said.

While Luzumova’s race team is limited at this point to the ‘sister act’ of trotting talent, the duo is soon to become a trio with another daughter of Streaming Sunbeam’s having entered the fold.

“We have recently acquired another sister to Streaming Live and High Intensity who is a rising two-year-old by En Solitaire. I also have another yearling also, by What the Hill who is quite a nice gelding. That is pretty much my team at the moment.

“Streaming Live has been back in work for three weeks, she has had about three months on the hill, we had some trouble with soreness in her stifle and when she came back she was racing ok, but started hitting herself in behind so we had to deal with that and ultimately decided to tip her out to freshen her up. Hopefully she will be back at the races in January sometime,” said Luzumova.

For complete Addington race fields, click here.

by Brad Reid, for Harnesslink