Snake bitten pacer makes remarkable milestone

Two hundred starts for any horse is an amazing achievement and remarkable show of longevity, but it’s just a little more special for harness racing’s 10-year-old standardbred Love Ina Chevy (Jeremes Jet).

Lance Justice’s much-loved pacer stepped out for his milestone appearance at Kilmore on Saturday night (Jul. 23), and while a last placing after a tough run wasn’t the fairytale result, the fact he’s even here racing is worth celebrating.

Since a well-publicised snake bite almost took his life in early 2016, Love Ina Chevy has had 177 starts and won 21 races to boast a career record of 30 victories and more than $380,000 in prizemoney.

It’s quite a feat for a horse that needed to be picked up off the ground for six weeks after the bite and endured a slow recovery before getting back to the track in late 2016.

He won his third start after returning to the races at Bendigo in November that year and has gone on to claim many more victories, highlighted by the Group 3 Ararat Pacing Cup in 2019.

“I have a really soft spot for him… he’s one of my favourite horses,” the Melton trainer-driver said.

“To get 200 starts, I just wonder how good he would have been had he not been bitten by a snake, had he not had that issue.”

Love Ina Chevy, who is owned by Colin Croft, scored his most recent win at Tabcorp Park Melton on June 25 to give young reinswoman Shannon O’Sullivan her maiden metropolitan race success.

LOVE INA CHEVY 2016 COMEBACK VIDEO

Despite competing in good form, Justice admitted there’ll soon come a time when Love Ina Chevy runs his final race and the curtain falls on a wonderful career.

“He’s probably not far from retirement,” Justice said.

“The horse is actually going really good. The horse is actually flying.”

Love Ina Chevy has been accepted to race in the Vale Stan Rutland Pace this Saturday night (Jul. 30) at Bendigo, which is the fifth and final leg of the metropolitan roadshow before racing returns to Tabcorp Park Melton next week.

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