By Michael Guerin
A relationship that dates back to the great Courage Under Fire combined to win the biggest race of the night at Addington on Friday.
But this time it was with a trotter called Paige, who bounced around between Bruce Negus and Colin De Filippi early in her career.
Negus and De Filippi were of course the combination that took the champion young pacer Courage Under Fire to 24 straight wins at the turn of the century before the horse moved to Brian Hancock’s care in New South Wales.
They were mates before the little champ came along and have been ever since so when Paige was a two-year-old Negus sent her to De Filippi and wife Julie to train.
“I thought she was going to make a nice trotter so asked them to train her,” recalls Negus.
“But a while later they sent her back and Colin said she got on her knees too much.
“So I sent him another horse called Oliver. But when this horse started going better I rang Col and told him I’d win $100,000 with her.
“Colin just laughed and said if I can win $100,000 with Paige he’d win $200,000 with Oliver.
“I hope he is right, I am looking forward to my share of that,” laughs Negus.
Paige may have her gait issues that see her wear spreaders but her win on Friday’s TK Plastering “About Now” Trot was her 12th and she has won over $135,000 in stakes.
“She has done a good job and so has young Sheree [Tomlinson] driving her,” says Negus.
“She is a very good young driver and a hell of a nice person so I like having her on.”
Tomlinson had Paige tucked away three deep on the markers and never went around a horse before holding out the late charge of Muscle Sass, the last 800m in 57.8 seconds putting paid to the chances of those back in the field.
While Paige won the main trot of the night the best pacing race saw Arthur Shelby make it four wins from five starts but not without some nervous moments for favourite punters.
Crossed at the start from barrier 1 he was locked away four deep before young driver Seth Hill went from the marker pegs to three wide and moving in the space of 50m down the back straight.
That and Arthur Shelby’s courage saw him claw home over the top of Radha and considering the winner was three wide and then parked over the last 800m in 55.9 seconds he is developing into one of the more exciting pacers in the South Island.
