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The Horsham Club on Monday afternoon, will play host for the running of the time-honoured $25,000 Tontine Championships for pacers and trotters on a huge, ten event card of harness racing action.
The West Side Horsham Tontine Championships are jointly conducted on a rotational basis by the South West Outer Zone Clubs (Ararat, Hamilton, Horsham, Stawell & Terang) with the support of HRV.
The first Tontine series for pacers was run in 1981 and saw the winner Kiwi Conference (Peter Rothacker) race four times in twelve days to earn the Tontine crown in a last-man-standing contest through heats, semi-finals and a final.
The 2021 editions have attracted very strong fields, with a number of very promising up-and-comers pitted against more-seasoned performers with the score on the board.
Hopes of a local victory in the West Side Tontine Pacing Championship, rest with two runners from the Aaron Dunn – Steve Blacker training camp.
Kenya NZ (Sam Barker) comes into the race as an emergency after the scratching of Dress Sense and is ideally drawn in gate one.
Dunn will drive his own horse Shady Azz (12) in the race, fresh from an impressive victory on Ballarat Cup night.
Veteran Horsham committeeman, owner, trainer and breeder Bill Deleeuw will be trackside on Monday afternoon and hoping for a touch of deja vu when Lotamuscle lines up in the West Side Trotting Championship.
Some thirty years ago at Stawell, the now part-owner of the Matty Craven trained trotter, cheered as his son Lance reined Lily Low to victory in the 1991 edition of the Tontine Trotting Final for the Bendigo Harness Racing Training Centre .
Monday's meeting is closed to the public but the West Side Trackview lounge will be open to follow the action "through the glass" with food, beverage, TAB and rest room facilities available downstairs.
Full fields, form, punting plan and gear changes for Horsham can be found at www.harness.org.au and all the action will be live streamed on Trots Vision and broadcast on SKY and racing radio.
They're off at Swan Hill (N) Tuesday 9th February; Ararat (N) Cup meeting Friday 12th; St. Arnaud @ Charlton (D) Sunday 14th; Terang (N) Cup meeting Saturday 20th & Stawell (D) Friday 26th.
From the sulky
