Magician books his Eureka Spot

Magician (Sweet Lou) is Eureka bound.

The Todd Rattray trained and driven four-year-old harness racing gelding booked himself a place into the world’s richest harness race, the TAB Eureka, at Menangle in Sydney’s south-west on 2 September.

The pacer secured Tasracing’s slot in the race after his dominant win in the Beautide in Hobart on Saturday night.

Some punters were concerned where the $2.05 favourite would end up from his outside of the second-row draw, but a lovely drive by Rattray settled the pacer in a brilliant spot.

“I thought I was going to have to do some work and end up in the breeze, so to land one-one I was pretty happy,” said the trainer-driver.

Mickey Oh did a bit of work to find the lead from a wide-front row draw and he put up a great battle in the home straight to be defeated by a neck, with De Goey flashing home for third, after galloping and losing ground on the first turn.

The mile rate for 2090m was 1m 58.8s.

“I think he is more of a stayer than a sprinter that’s why I came out early, but he wanted to hang a bit on the corner which cost him a bit of momentum, but once he straightened up he was pretty good,” Rattray said.

Rattray has always believed that more racing would benefit the horse, and he is starting to see some improvement with the pacers racing mannerisms according to his trainer-driver.

“His last couple of runs I have sat him up and sprinted home, and he is starting to learn to do that, I think he would have been better with a horse outside him to get him going,” he explained.

Rattray is yet to organise his plans for the upcoming Eureka mission.

“I have been just trying to get through the Beautide, it was hard enough with a lot of nice horses in it.

“I will have to organise transport and work out what we are going to do.

“I would like to get a race or trial into him up there, but we will have to wait and see what happens,” Rattray said.

The pacer was bred by long time breeder Barry Stewart, who races the horse in partnership with Todd’s mother Denise.

“It was good for Barry Stewart to get a feature win like that, he was emotional after the race which I haven’t seen from him before.

Connections of second placegetter Mickey Oh, will decide in the next 48-hours if they elect to nominate for The Singo at Menangle on 19 August, which slot holder John Singleton will decide a horse to represent his slot in the Eureka, with the four emergencies also coming through that race.

Both horses secured a $5,000 travel voucher, part of the race conditions for their Sydney trip to compete in those races.

For complete race results, click here.

by Duncan Dornauf, for Tasracing