June 9, 2017
Egg Tart, the stylish heroine of last Saturday’s Queensland Oaks, is not the only link the key contest has with the South Burnett.
As outlined in previous columns, the Sebring filly was bred by Wondai couple Julie and Tony Brown and back in 1989, and went on to win the Nanango Cup and subsequently ran third in the Oaks.
That three-year-old was Gentle Persuasion, the Jim Bannon trained daughter of Gist that had earlier picked up the minor money in her hometown Cup.
The Toowoomba filly had not made the final lineup for a lead up run in Brisbane, so her side was forced to go elsewhere and the mile task at Nanango was the substitute.
On a track with a good rating, she flew home to prevail by a short half head over Cheeky Fella.
Gentle Persuasion (Michael Pelling, 12/1) was not all hampered by the heavy Oaks day conditions and ran a bottler of a race.
Her ownership included Steve Barr, who was running the Kingaroy Indoor Cricket centre, and Toowoomba grain buyer Neale Kleinhanss, a former Nanango resident and nephew of Gwenda and Kevin Kleinhanss who were Nanango Race Club officials at the time.
The Geoff Murphy prepared Triumphal Queen (Ken Russell, 3//1), from the same family as Straight Draw (Melbourne Cup), Ilumquh (Caulfield Cup) and General Command (AJC Metropolitan Handicap), secured the Oaks glory.
Although the chestnut by Triumphal March survived a strong protest by the connections of the runner-up Iroquois Miss, she did not continue her Brisbane campaign.
But Gentle Persuasion did, and she was not disgraced when she ran fifth in the Grand Prix and midfield in the Derby on slow surfaces.
Also during the 1989 Nanango Cup program, Ricky Leisfield booted home Veiled Hue for Danny Duke, the trainer who saddled up Daybreak Lover for his pair of Stradbroke successes.
Paul Hamblin, who rode at Lee Park’s May fixture just a fortnight ago, handled the 1989 Cup runner-up.
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Busy Hopetoun Streets
Hopetoun Street, the in-form mare that is a member of Glenn Richardson’s Nanango team, will have her 19th outing for the season when she goes to Gayndah on Saturday.
It will be hectic at Hopetoun Street in Doomben, too: one end of the thoroughfare is near the railway station, and the other stares at the back of the racecourse’s grandstand.
Leisfield and Glenn’s brother Brad Richardson are Brisbane Clerks Of The Course.
The latter lives in Hopetoun Street and has a share in the racehorse with the same name.
She has been a great money spinner, putting together seven wins, five seconds and five thirds since moving from Victoria to her present home in the spring of 2015.
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(Photo: Ross Stanley)
Coming Up
The State’s premier race day, with three Group Ones to be decided, will again be staged at Doomben on Saturday.
While some horses would have been better off on the shifty, dubious surface that Eagle Farm would almost certainly have provided, last Saturday’s Oaks Day results saw favourites fare much better than was the case seven days earlier.
The distances from first to last were embarrassing, and some gallopers were physically strained and stressed by the widely condemned conditions.
The downside of the Doomben offering is the shortening of some race journeys and a tighter circuit.
But it is not hard to imagine the crisis that would have emerged if the Eagle Farm option stood and significant rain had fallen before or during the prime occasion.
The Brisbane Racing Club pulled out all stops to enhance the marquee facilities for last Saturday.
The infrastructure was expanded on the collection for Doomben Cup day two weeks earlier, but there was still plenty of room for growth: patrons made little use of the seating in the main grandstand.
Given the venue accommodated Black Caviar’s only Queensland appearance, racegoers attending the Stradbroke-Derby-J.J.Atkins program should expect to be well catered for.
Meanwhile, Gympie (June 24), Esk (July 1) and Wondai (July 8) are some of the forthcoming country, non-TAB programs.
