A perfect lead into $200,000 Golden Nugget for Joe

Lavra Joe (Roll With Joe) delivered an all the way victory in harness racing’s $35,000 Gr3 Alabar Stud Farm Pinjarra 4YO Classic on Monday (Nov.7), in what has been quite the exciting and successful weekend for trainer Ray Jones.

Leading all the way from barrier four, the run for the $1.50 favourite looked to be the perfect lead up win, with the Group 1 $200,000 Golden Nugget in sight for the talented four-year-old at Gloucester Park on December 16.

“We gave him a bit of a quiet time, yeah he went good, I thought I’d just give a bit of a freshen up for the last nine days, because he’s had some hard racing against the free for all-ers, and that sort of knocked him around a little bit, freshened up good and went really good,” Jones said.

“We will just run the three four-year-old races over the next four weeks, up until the Nugget.”

The 2021 3YO Colt/Gelding of the year currently sits on stakes of $443,000, with the feature races in the coming weeks a real chance of seeing the now gelding crack the half a million, with Jones confirming he will be heading to Gloucester Park next Friday to contend the $50,000 4YO Championship.

“Pulled up good as gold, running around the paddock at 100 mile an hour, so, very happy.”

It’s been a big weekend for Jones and his runners, with his ‘dark horse’ Been Scootin running a fantastic fifth in the big one on Friday night, the $200,000 Gr1 WA Derby, with the three-year-old narrowly beaten for fourth on the line after being three wide for the last 800m.

“He’s actually turned into a bit of a surprise packet; it was a huge run.”

“I don’t know if he’s been talking to his mate (Lavra Joe) or what, but it’s been a big surprise, a very pleasant surprise.

“Big surprise for him to turn out as good as he has done.”

Been Scootin will head to Pinjarra on Monday for the $30,000 WA Country Derby over the 2692m trip, with Jones “quite excited” to see how his surprise horse will go.

“he’s got a bit of versatility; he came with a very strong run in the derby.”

Jones, who is no stranger to a good horse did mention that Lavra Joe and Been Scootin are likely to be the last horse he trains, with the 67-year-old looking forward to a slower paced lifestyle and time to travel.

“I sort of said these are the last two I’m having.”

“I just think, if you want to train horses you have to give it 110% and I’m doing a lot of traveling, a lot of time, no days off.”

“And I think when these two-finish racing I’ll just have a bit of time off myself, go and see the world, while I can still walk,”

“(I’ll) Go out on a high, it’s an addiction anyway, I might go and do a trip around or spend a year and get sick of that and come back and go and get another one, I just always promised myself I would do a bit of travelling before I got too old and too old is catching up.”

For complete race results, click here.

by Ashleigh Paikos, for RWWA