Flying Without Wings doing just that

At the Invercargill Harness Racing Club meeting at Ascot Park today (Nov. 29) the Nathan Williamson trotter Flying Without Wings (Pegasus Spur) notched up his third win and is beginning to put together a consistent formline.

The three year old bred by Michelle Caig is owned by Riverton fisherman Neville Cleaver.

“I went to Michelle’s stable to have a look at another horse and decided I didn’t like the horse I was looking at. I was just about ready to leave and turned around and this horse was looking at me. I looked at him, negotiated with Michelle and bought him. I like to look at them and liked his structure. He’s taken a bit of time because he was quite a lean sort of a horse earlier. He’s always had speed and he’s just starting to fill out now.”

Caid had named Flying Without Wings after the Mr Mister song.

Cleaver said he was confident today after receiving good reports from the horse’s trainer Nathan Williamson.

“Nathan rang me last night and told me the horse was working tremendous and his recovery rate after he worked him the other day was out of this world. So I was expecting big things to be fair.”

Flying Without Wings is out of Sun Mist, a daughter of the 1997-1998 Horse of the Year Merinai. Caig will be offering a Majestic Son filly out of Sun Mist at the upcoming NZB Standardbred Yearling Sales in Christchurch.

Earlier in the Fast Ten programme Contessa’s Pride (Majestic Son) part owned by Cleaver was on her best behaviour when she won at long odds. The four year old mare trained at Mataura by Lyndon Bond has been a serial mistake maker but today she made the most of some of her opposition losing their chances. She remained calm and was too strong for Storm Cloud.

“She’s a bit of a bombshell to be fair. A bird could fly out of the grass and she’ll just break for no reason. She’s a nervous watch but Sarah (O’Reilly) said she did everything right.”

Luckily Contressa’s Pride didn’t spot the two ducklings that were coming and going close to the winning post at today’s races. Today’s win was the mare’s first from thirteen starts.

by Bruce Stewart, for Harnesslink