Second Traralgon Pacing Cup for Sugars

Top horseman Greg Sugars won his second Traralgon Pacing Cup at the Warragul trots harness racing meeting last Friday afternoon.

 

Sugars drove in five of the six races run on the day, and collected four wins.

 

His wife, Jess Tubbs, trained two of those winners, namely Treacherous Rock in the two-year-old race, and La Puddie in the feature $10,000 Pacing Cup.

 

The Cup event produced one of the most exciting finishes seen in the race's history. La Puddie led, and Sugars rated his horse beautifully in the lead.

 

Several of his eight rivals launched strong attacks inside the final 400 metres, with Joonior Brown and Didnt I sweeping down the outside in the home straight.

 

La Puddie held on to win in a three-way photo finish, by a short half head, with a similar margin separating second and third.

 

La Puddie is a three-year-old gelding raced by the Munnerley and Jose families and was only having its thirteenth start on Friday afternoon.

 

The horse was taking on older rivals in the Pacing Cup, and is only the third three-year-old to win the Cup after Kotare Knight in 1979 and Sahara Tiger last year.

 

Sugars had previously won the Traralgon Pacing Cup driving Bettor Rock On in 2014, for his trainer father Ross.

 

Greg Sugars with horse La Puddie and the silverware after the race

 

The Traralgon Pacing Cup trophies were sponsored this year by Brian and Pat Andjelkovic, who were heavily involved with the former Traralgon Harness Racing Club before it closed in 1995.

 

The Pacing Cup is now staged at Warragul each year in recognition of the former Traralgon club.

 

Warragul Harness Racing Club president Steve Austen, based at Labertouche, trained a winner at Friday's meeting when Kick It To Jack led throughout to score, while Caabello came from a 20 metre handicap to win the trotters race for Iona trainer Michael Hughes.

 

Those two local winners were the other pair of successes for reinsman Sugars.