Skewbald and son ready to roll

Team Teal won’t be the only splash of colour in tonight’s opener at Ballarat, when a skewbald stallion returns from a seven-year lay-off to battle a nine-horse field that includes his son.

The unusual occurrence hails from the stable of Karlene and Graham ‘Tinny’ Tindale, whose life-long involvement in the trots has taken a back seat to travel in recent years and thus their nine-year-old skewbald stallion Ernie Eldorado’s career stuttered after three starts.

That all changes at Bray Raceway tonight, when the horse by Safari out of dam Elegant White Star steps out for the Support Team Teal Vicbred Maiden Pace, with his four-year-old progeny, Ernieson, drawn on his outside.

“Ernie Eldorado was named after Tinny’s father,” trainer Karlene Tindale said. “We bred him by Safari, but for the last eight years or so have been travelling for half of the year and so don’t have time to have horses in work.

“We came home in November, he was feeling good the stallion, so we stuck him in work with the others and thought we may as well race him.”

Before moving to Victoria in 2007 the Tindales trained extensively from Serpentine in Western Australia, including breaking in and preparing thousands of babies for Mick Lombardo’s Lombo fleet as well as training plenty themselves.

Karlene said they had about 60 horses in work in Perth, but have stepped back to hobbyist status in their latter years to travel and escape the Ballarat winters.

Tonight she trains her first starters of the season, with Ernie Eldorado and Ernieson’s race one battle preceding their filly Ammichi, a last start Group 1 placegetter in The Allwood, making her track return.

While Ammichi is an example of their nicely bred prospects from racing lines, the Ernies are representative of another fascination.

”We love the coloured horses and have had them for years,” Karlene Tindale said. “Ernie (Eldorado)’s a bit special, being named after Tinny’s father, so we have kept him.

“We really don’t know how he’s going to do. Of course he will need the run, he hasn’t trialled, but hopefully he will go well. He’s the best coloured horse we’ve bred, generally they don’t run very fast.”

Race debutant Ernieson, who is by Ernie Eldorado out of Life Of Chiquita, is a bay gelding and not the hoped for skewbold, and he enters tonight with modest expectations from the camp.

“(Ernie Eldorado’s) better than Ernieson, who’s a beautiful little pacer and a lovely little horse, but he’s going to need the experience.”

Beyond the results, the Tindales are just looking forward to being trackside again and watching their home-bred troop strut their stuff.

“I’m looking forward to tonight,” Karlene said. “We will be surprised by what they do, it will be exciting. We love it, it’s in our blood. I just hope they go good.”

HRV Trots Media – Michael Howard