Catching up with the Joneses

Adele Jones has an eye for good bloodstock and her training partnership with her husband Derek has taken this harness racing couple on a journey with many successful highlights.

Derek has been a farrier for all his adult life while Adele comes from an equestrian background.

“I just pottered around, got young thoroughbreds off the track and mucked around with them. I did showing. There’s no time for that now, (laughter)” she said. “She’s not allowed,” Derek added.

Derek is the nephew of DG Jones who was one of Canterbury’s best known and respected horsemen and he shod for his uncle for thirty five years.

“My father (Peter) was a qualified blacksmith and he asked me what I wanted to do after I got kicked out of school (Riccarton High) when I was sixteen. I started shoeing the next day.”

Derek and Adele who’ve been married for forty years, have spent a good portion of their life in the poultry industry and bought their first chicken farm in 1999.

“I wanted to get out of shoeing so we bought a poultry farm and farmed chickens for Tegel. All up we did the poultry thing for twenty years. It was very profitable and helped us move on and gave us the lifestyle we’ve got now.

It was while they were at their second farm in West Melton that Derek became interested in amateur driving. A friend suggested he do the course.

“I finished up having a drive from behind the mobile on the Sunday and thought ‘gosh what have I been doing all my life?” He was hooked.

Their first horse was Duarunner (Tinted Cloud) who’d had a number of other trainers before Jones took her on.

“We bought her off Brian Kerr and paid a $1,000. I wanted her just to do some amateur trials. Colin and Julie DeFilippi thought she could win another race. So we took her to the races and she did.”

At that time they lived on a chicken farm in West Melton with only a little jog track. They started off under the supervision of Colin and Julie de Filippi and would float the horse to their place for fast work. Later they went to Michael House’s track.

We used to jog our horses around the road to Michael House’s and work them there. We either would go to Michael’s, Colin DeFilippi’s or Graham Court’s. Everybody was just absolutely fantastic in helping us out.”
Duarunner’s win which was Derek’s first, was at the Cheviot meeting in March 2008.

In 2010 Derek and Adele decided to be brave and ventured to the Christchurch Yearling Sales.

“We’d trained Duarunner and mucked round with a few older horses. We decided to have a crack with a yearling. Adele is a better judge of a horse than me so I said to her to choose a pacing colt. She found a horse and we ended up buying it, but it was a trotting filly (Sunny Kash) so it was completely opposite to what I wanted.”

However the Joneses weren’t finished there. They went back on the third day of the sale.

“Basically, the third day was a cheap day. I went because of the social aspect, catching up with a few friends and having a few beers. Adele went away to look at the horses, came back and said she wanted to buy a horse that was about to come into the ring. I thought, you’ve got to be kidding. We don’t need another one!”

But Derek fell into line and went to two and a half thousand on a pacing filly before Adele convinced him to put in another bid.

“We went to three thousand and got it. It turned out to be Elusive Chick (laughter). I totally have my wife to thank for that.”

Elusive Chick (McArdle) won thirteen races for Tim Butt and was placed a further twenty two times in her fifty eight starts, earning $418,586.

“We trained her for her first start. She ran second but she galloped on the home turn because she was touching a knee. I said to Adele that that was a bit much for me. We got a really good offer to buy her, so we sold half, kept half and Tim Butt trained her after that.”

Her biggest win was in the Group One Four Year Old Diamond at Ashburton. She was also placed in the NZ Yearling Sales Series, Nevele R Fillies Series Final, Three Year Old Diamond, Queen Of Hearts and New Zealand Breeders Stakes.

Five of her wins were in Australia where she was also placed in the Group One NSW Oaks.

After she finished racing the Joneses bred from Elusive Chick with her first foal Lulu Le Mans (Bettor’s Delight) winning ten races for Mark Jones.

Elusive Chick then lost two Sweet Lou foals before leaving Kashkeeper which Stonewall Stud bought for $210,000. He won three before he also died.

“We sold her Captaintreacherous filly at the Sales this year for good money ($140,000) and my driver Kim Butt bought her for Josh Devine”.

Sunny Kash has also turned out to be a very good race and broodmare.

She won six of her fifty one starts and was placed a further eleven times. She ran second to Escapee in the Group Three Hambletonian Classic at Ashburton.

“She was very strong minded” Adele said, “But all her foals are just lovely horses to work with,” Derek added.
At stud she’s left Clicquot (Orlando Vici) which won once in just six starts, Eurokash (Love You), and Eurostyle who won eight each, and Kashanova (Love You).

Kashanova has appeared at two trials for Greg and Nina Hope as a two year old and qualified when running second behind Habibti Pat.

“We’ve kept a share in him because they think he’s very good. He’s very big.”

Eurostyle (Orlando Vici) is the stable’s latest star but she hasn’t been straightforward and she’s required plenty of managing because of tying up issues.

“We’re still working her out. She’s not the perfect gaited trotter yet but by gee, she’s got a motor I tell yah. If I’d known about what we’re dealing with – tie up, I think Sunny Kash would have done a lot better job too,” Derek said.

But help with the issue was just a phone call away.

“Mark (Jones) suggested we work her every day and not jog her. We started doing that and she got better and better. She used to have a very average gait and when she was going top speed she’d come right. Muscle Sass is the same. She’s had tie up issues too. So we work them the same.”

Eurostyle has won eight from just twenty eight starts and she ran second in the Group Three DG Jones Banks Peninsula Cup.

The Joneses also have a two year old filly out of Sunny Kash in work called Miss Moneypenny (Majestic Son). She went to her first workout recently.

“She’s my star. She to me could be the best of them all. She’s got perfect manners and is a beautifully gaited trotter. She’s still just a fraction weak and if I’m doing the job right, I should just qualify her and then put her out. There’s nothing really for her until the end of the year anyway. She’ll benefit from having a wee spell.”

Another trotting mare that’s been successful for Derek and Adele is Muscle Sass (Muscle Mass).

She’s out of the Sundon mare Sunny CJ and was bred by Cath Ironside. It’s a family that’s produced Chiola’s Lass (10), Cabaletta (7) and Allegro Agitato (22).

“She was quite weak, but she’s just getting stronger and stronger. Her quarters have filled out and she’s getting more confident. She’s a very nervy horse who sweats up when she goes to the races and is not the most pleasant horse to be around. She’ll bite you and kick you but has got an owner Cath, (Ironside) that works with her and just loves her to bits. I think she’ll go a long way but maybe more next year.”

Of the thirty winners the couple have trained, twenty have been trotters. They also trained Majestic Lavros (Majestic Son) to win two races including the Listed Uncut Gems. He’d previously won seven races for Mark Jones.

“Kypros (owners Kyros Kotzikas) rang Mark and asked him if he could give us Majestic Lavros to train because we were right on his doorstep (training establishment Lavros Lodge) and he’d like to see the horse train. I rang Mark and he was okay about it. He (Majestic Lavros) did quite a good job for us but had massive issues with quarter crack so that was the other reason he came here with me being a blacksmith.”

Despite winding down his blacksmith business, Derek continues to enjoy the challenge of shoeing a trotter.

“I don’t shoe for anyone else really. I love shoeing the trotters. If you get them right and they don’t hit, you’re so much better off,” he said.

Derek and Adele have two children Nick and Chelsea along with five grandchildren.

“Chelsea had a pony and drove Duarunner a few times when she went out to Colin’s (DeFilippi) back in the day. Her husband Tyson (Keats) has got shares in two of our horses,” Derek said.

Recently Kimberly Butt has been doing all the driving for the stable.

“Her grandmother Jenny and I are first cousins. It’s a massive family. Kim has come on board and drives our horses and I wouldn’t have anyone else. She gives you great feedback.”

The Joneses now train out of Lavros Lodge. They’ve got a small team but that’s the way they operate, paying close attention to detail which they say is essential when training trotters.

“The thing with a trotter is there’s nowhere to hide. With a pacer the hopples can mask many things. With the trotters if things aren’t right, you soon know about it. It’s observing the little subtleties,” Adele said.

by Bruce Stewart, for Harnesslink