Higgs makes a comeback

It’s not that Wayne Higgs has ever left harness racing, he’s just had other things to do and training his own horses has been put on the backburner.

However he was back in the winner’s circle as a trainer yesterday at Addington, notching up his 210^th career winner when Memphis Blaster (Bettor’s Delight) scored his maiden win.

“He’s a work in progress. He’s in tight wee hopples at the moment, didn’t get his earplugs pulled yesterday and wasn’t pacing a 100% up the straight. He’s not the finished product but you’d like to hope he will improve,” Higgs said.

The three year old who was handled by Samantha Ottley, came up the passing lane to win by half a length.

MEMPHIS BLASTER REPLAY

“I train on my own on the beach. I needed to get him over to Mark Jones about a week or so ago just to get him used to trailing other horses. It helped him by being at Mark’s who put that wee bit of polish on him.”

Memphis Blaster is out of broodmare gem Memphis Melody which has left 14 foals of racing age between 2005 and 2021 and all have qualified. She’s left nine race winners who have won eighty one races between them. Her best racehorses have been Delightful Memphis 20 wins, Stylish Memphis 15 and Virgina Lightning 13.

“She’s in foal to Bettor’s Delight and I’m hopeful of getting a filly.”

Wayne is breeding from two of Memphis Melody’s daughters – Stylish Memphis and Delightful Memphis.

“I was quite distraught this year because Stylish Memphis foaled a beautiful filly by Captaintreacherous and after three days at the Stud it broke its shoulder so that was very disappointing. You’d probably be looking at a $250,000 – $300,000 foal out of that mare.”

Higgs who trains at Spencer Park, an extension of Woodend Beach, says it’s likely that Memphis Blaster will be sold.

“If the right price comes along we’ll look to move him on. I think Australia would be his best port of call.”

The win by Memphis Blaster was Higgs first in over four years. His last winner prior to yesterday was Michelle at Reefton in March 2020. Prior to that his previous winner was Greenburn Creek at Oamaru in July 2015.

“I’ve just been busy with other projects. But I am hopeful from next month to get back into doing just a few more. I was going to unleash at the weanling sales but I had a bit of a glitch with my log in on the day. I was sitting at home fuming because I’d planned to get a dozen. The next morning I felt good because I still had the $150,000 in the bank but it would have been a great time to buy.”

Higgs has trained 210 winners, his first was Silk Fields at Greymouth in 1998.

The following season he trained 52 winners and was third on the New Zealand Trainers Premiership behind John Lischner (85) and Mark Purdon (78).

“That was back in the days when races were worth $2,000 each. Unfortunately the economics wasn’t there and although we had a good time, to keep going forward on those rates you were losing large amounts of money because I owned most of the horses.”

Wayne’s best horse so far has been White Arrow (Sands A Flyin) which won eleven races from just forty nine starts. Higgs drove the gelding in the 2006 New Zealand Cup won by Mainland Banner.

“Like most horse stories we never saw the best of him.”

White Arrow won the Canterbury Classic (The Nobilo) with Higgs doing the steering and the Listed New Zealand Junior FFA in 2006 for driver Todd Woodward, paying $68.60 to win.

“He was the best horse I’ve ever trained by far.”

Other good winners for Higgs have been Reklaw’s Chance which won ten and Benatom, Totally Different, Quilter and Motu Armbro Scott which all won seven.

Murray Rennie has driven 54 winners for Higgs while Todd Woodward has reined 40 for the stable with Higgs driving 42 of his own runners.

Before getting into harness racing Higgs decommissioned a lot of the regional rail tracks for NZ Rail and onsold the railway sleepers.

“I was doing the sleepers many years ago and dealing in them. I did some general contracting for NZ Rail and pulled out a few railway bridges as well. They were cutting back on some of their old lines that hadn’t been used for ages. I then went into horses for a while. I’ve just finished a few business projects, subdivisions and property and now I’m just looking to ease up a bit and play around with the odd horse.”

For complete race results, click here.

by Bruce Stewart, for Harnesslink