Female drivers Premiership goes down to the wire

Nine meetings remain for the 2023 harness racing season in Tasmania, and while most awards are clear-cut, there is one title that will go down to the wire.

The state’s leading female driver award sees Olivia Weidenbach and Tiarna Ford head into Sunday night’s Hobart meeting as joint leaders with 24 wins a peace.

Three of the remaining meetings are to be held on King Island, where Ford’s mother, Tammy Langley, currently has a satellite stable.

Ford, in her third season in the sulky, is having her best season and is only $1,200 away from surpassing $200,000 in stake earnings.

She has seven drives on the program with Hes Apples (race four) and Bonny My Boy (race eight) being some of her better chances.

Weidenbach goes into the meeting fresh after claiming the state’s premier junior drivers series, the 6ty Youngbloods Challenge, and has eight drives with Terror The Christian (race seven) appearing to be her best chance on the program.

Other premiership leaders are:
Leading driver: Mark Yole 92 wins,
Leading trainer: Ben Yole 268 wins,
Leading female trainer: Tammy Langley 44 wins,
Leading junior driver: Jacob Duggan 43 wins.

The feature race on the Hobart card is the Toreace Flying Mile, which has attracted a capacity field with Villacci and Rackemup Tigerpie being equal favourites in early markets.

Race one is scheduled for 17:34 and will be shown on Sky Racing 2, with the remaining races to be shown on Sky Racing 1.

All races can be seen on TasracingTV.

For complete race entries, click here.

by Duncan Dornauf, for Tasracing