Better Be The Best switches trainers

Leading Bathurst trainer-driver Nathan Turnbull will be a noted absentee from harness racing form guides in upcoming weeks with the busy horseman taking a well-earned break to travel with his family to the United States.

But the same cannot be said for his star juvenile Better Be The Best (Shoobees Place), as he will continue his quest for another Group 1 victory under the watchful eye of Nathan’s father Steve.

After obliterating a class field of three-year-old colts and geldings in the Group 2 New South Wales Breeders Challenge Blue final at Tabcorp Park Menangle on Saturday night, Turnbull and owner Chris Buttigieg made the decision to place Better Be The Best in Steve’s care to prepare for the major Breeders Challenge Series that begins with qualifying heats later this month.

Turnbull confirmed that he had earmarked the heat at Bathurst on September 20 for the colt, when his sister Amanda will take the reins in his absence.

“This was always in our plans for his preparation, but we just wanted to take things one step at a time with this guy and let him do the talking,” said Nathan.

“So, after him racing so well on Saturday and the ease in which he won, we are more than satisfied to push on with the plans we had mapped out.

“There are no two people in the world that I could trust more than Dad and Amanda.

“They are both champions, so he will be in the best hands possible, there’s no doubt.

“Amanda quipped that she thought she should get a feel of him in last weekend’s final but there was no way I was getting off.

“Winning that final in the way he did and in front of such a big crowd was the ultimate feeling.

“When he raced clear halfway down the lane, I simply sat and enjoyed every step down to the finish line.”

by Michael Dumesny, for HRNSW