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Two year olds for the rest of this season and into the first half of the next, will get lots of chances to race for good money in the south.
Southern Harness has programmed a tentative pathway for the juveniles starting this Thursday at Gore and rolling through until 25th May next year.
A mixture of colts and geldings, fillies, open and non-win heats are planned, all with a $15,000 minimum stake. Some fillies pathway races will be worth $20,000. A fillies and separate colts and gelding race are booked for Invercargill Cup day on 22nd of December and these two races will be worth $25,000.
From March next year when a new crop of two year olds will be up and running, Southern Harness has stepped the minimum stake up to $20,000, again mixing in races for juvenile colts and geldings and fillies.
The Caduceus Club of Southland Fillies Classic (G3) remains in place for the Northern Southland TC meeting in March 2024 and carries a stake of $40,000.
A Kindergarten Prelude will be programmed for the Wyndham HRC on 16th of March leading into the G2 $60,000 Kindergarten Stakes on the same course twelve days later.
An exciting new race, the G2 $70,000 Entain Two Year Old Fillies Southern will be held at Winton on 13th of April and The Murray Gray Memorial for the colts and geldings will be raced on the same day.
All the 2024 races lead in to the new G1 $110,000 Diamond Creek Farm Two Year Old Classic on Diamonds Day.
The two year old trotters will be catered for as well in the 2024 season with $20,000 races programmed for 16th of March at Wyndham and 4th April at Invercargill.
The G3 Entain Southern Two Year Old Trot is another exciting new race and will run on Diamonds Day on the 21st of April 2024 with a stake of $50,000.
Two year old racing is receiving a big push in the next two seasons with Entain pledging an additional one off $2 million payment to HRNZ to use to promote two year old racing.
$1.5 million will be spent on a two year old bonus scheme ($750,000 per year) with $8,000 paid to owners and $4,000 to the breeder of a horse that records its first win in a two year old totalisator race from 1st January 2024.
Now is certainly the time to have a two year old on your books!
by Bruce Stewart, for Harnesslink
