Mister Rea’s remarkable comeback after 1231 days

Temora husband-and-wife team Jane and Ray Walker have pulled off one of the most remarkable harness racing training feats of the season, producing their former star juvenile Mister Rea (Pet Rock) to win – 1231 days since his last race start.

To put it in perspective, that’s three years, four months, two weeks and two days!

Mister Rea was nothing short of brilliant in his 2021 debut season, emerging as Australia’s then-fastest two-year-old (1:52.1) and reeling off five consecutive wins, including the prestigious Group 1 Bathurst Gold Crown and the Group 2 Sapling Stakes at Menangle.

But his career came to a screeching halt, with injuries forcing him to the sidelines, racing just three times as a three-year-old before his reappearance at the age of six at Riverina Paceway, Wagga Wagga, last Friday (August 8).

“He originally had a quarter crack in his two-year-old season, but that really was nothing – some good friends of ours, Bruce Fox and Darryl Perrot, helped us sort that out,” Ray Walker explained.

“It was tendon issues after that, and then he had trouble with both of his front fetlock joints. Those are the reasons he was away from the races for so long,” he said.

“We got him through the tendon issues and back to the trials, and then it was the fetlocks. So we just had to play along and play along with him.”

Remarkably, Walker said Mister Rea had been in work, in some capacity, for most of the past three-and-a-half years.

“Being a stallion, he’d roar around and do more damage if you put him in the paddock. So it was a case of walking him, jogging him, keeping him a little bit active the whole time to try to manage him and get him healthy,” Walker said.

“Thankfully he is a very relaxed customer and a lovely horse to do anything with. Anyone could take him for a walk and we spent a lot of time doing that, and once he was reasonable, started jogging him, then a bit of fast work.

“We haven’t got anything here that’s much good, so we kept working him with the slow ones!”

Walker said there was never any question about persevering.

“There was never any doubt that we would do what we had to – he’s ours and he’s been so good to us.”

Mister Rea was bred by the Walkers, and owned by them, along with longtime friend Greg O’Callaghan.

Mister Rea is beautifully bred. His dam, Just Glenburn (Village Jasper), was a 17-time winner, including the Vicbred 2YO Fillies Final in 2005, while his grand dam, Glenburn Smoothie (Smooth Fella), was described by Walker as “even better” but plagued by issues.

“From the first day he was born, you just looked at him and thought ‘he looks like a horse’. And he was – just a natural from day one,” Walker said.

The Wagga win came courtesy of a cool and composed drive by young concession reinsman Ky Bloomfield, whose five-point claim allowed Mister Rea’s lift into the up to NR53 event.

Bloomfield allowed Mister Rea to balance early before working to the death-seat and surging away in the straight.

Watch the replay here:

“Everyone I asked told me that Ky would be up to the job. It’s a bit of pressure on a kid to go out on a horse that hasn’t raced for three-and-a-half years but is going to be odds-on, but he handled it well,” Walker said.

As for the future, Walker said the approach would be simple.

“We’ll just keep cruising along. When horses have had problems like he has, they’re always a 50-50 proposition. But we’ll just keep treating him as a normal horse,” he said.

“He’s probably around 80 percent, and if we can keep him in one piece, he will get better each run. Just to win a race – that was the first plan, and that’s the second as well!”

From Terry Gange for Harnesslink