Pauline rides Wave of emotions

While scenes of jubilation played out at Menangle on Saturday night as Catch A Wave (Captaintreacherous) completed a memorable Chariots of Fire/Miracle Mile harness racing double, Pauline Matthews watched on from her home on the outskirts of Port Fairy with a small gathering of family and friends.

She’s now the sole owner of one of harness racing’s biggest and brightest stars, but hasn’t been back to the racetrack since the passing of her husband Richard late last year.

It’s still too hard for the 76-year-old to return to a place she shared so many special times with a best friend of more than five decades.

Will she ever be back? Maybe. But right now the pain of his passing is still too raw.

Richard was the man in everyone’s thoughts on Saturday night after the horse he’d bought and raced captured the sport’s most prestigious sprint less than six months after his death in September 2022.

“I’m just sorry I can’t get him out of the grave and send him up to watch the race because he’d be so thrilled to know what’s going on with that horse,” Pauline told thetrots.com.au.

“He just loved it… (trainer) Andy (Gath) had said it had potential, but it just had to stay sound.

“It’s bittersweet, I suppose, to say it best.”

While Pauline stayed home with son Paul, the Matthews clan was in full force at Menangle on the weekend. The couple’s other children in David, Cathy and Danielle attended with a tribe of grandkids, and despite having no serious passion for harness racing, they all revelled in a special night at the races.

“We’d always done things separately, but Richard and I came together for the trotting because we both loved it,” Pauline recalled.

“I loved the trotting and he loved the pacing. It’s just a bit too hard for me to go…

“I was thrilled the children and grandchildren went up… Richard would have been thrilled to bits because when he was alive, they didn’t really show any interest.”

As if sensing the magnitude of the occasion, Catch A Wave delivered on the big stage. And in some style.

After causing the initial start to be aborted, the son of Captaintreacherous worked his way to the lead in the early stages of the race and was never seriously challenged on his way to a brilliant victory over Spirit Of St Louis and Honolua Bay.

He became the first horse since Have Faith In Me in 2016 to win the Chariots/Miracle Mile double in the same year, with Gath’s wife Kate becoming just the fourth female to drive the winner of the Grand Circuit classic.

“Katie and Andy have been exceptional,” Pauline said.

“They were always really good friends of the family… we can’t speak highly enough of Katie and Andy.

“We had champagne and lots of fun at home, not on the track.

“We cried and then we laughed. And then we cried, then laughed and hugged… all the emotions. It was very, very emotional.

“We had it on channel 528 and we could see the children and the grandchildren. Cathy was on the phone and we couldn’t hear a thing, but she was just so excited.

“The excitement – it was just infectious. It was just fantastic, we just loved it.”

Catch A Wave will now spell, with sights set on the inaugural running of the TAB Eureka back at Menangle later this year.

The horse, who has now won 17 of 22 career starts, will race for slot holders Cordina Chickens in the $2.1million feature on September 2.

“He’ll come home. We’ve got a paddock there and he can just be a horse again for a couple of months while he has a break,” Pauline said.

“And then when it’s time for him to go back, Andy will let me know and I’ll send him back.”

Pauline said Richard had dearly loved his time in harness racing, which started in the late 1990s and proved an outlet from the pressures of running the Matthews Petroleum business that he successfully managed for over 50 years.

“Richard would be so excited to know that he bought a horse that’s so jolly good, and it’s got a beautiful nature as well as being good,” she said.

“After his family, I’d say the horses were the next great love.”

by Tim O’Connor, for Harness Racing Victoria