Pull the other one! Non winner among award nominees and several glaring omissions

Some glaring omissions from the list of season awards contenders demand that Harness Racing New Zealand revisits its selection criteria.

How can a horse who raced seven times, did not win, and earned just $6750 feature among the four nominees for the best four-year-old trotting entire or gelding?

And yet overlooked in the same category is a horse who banked the third highest amount in stakes, $58,195, and won six races.

That’s the ludicrous result of HRNZ’s focus on performances from Group and feature races.

The non winner is former good three-year-old Outamyway who so under-performed trainer Paul Nairn even tried him twice as a pacer.

Outamyway’s formline for the season read 4, 3, 11, 11, 7, 7, 6 but he leapfrogged several other candidates through that third which came in the Group III Lyell Creek Stakes at Auckland last February behind Bolt For Brilliance and Sundees Son. In an eight-horse field, where two horses galloped at the start and took no part, he beat home Kings Landing, Anditover and Crazy.

Compare that record to Arna Donnelly’s up-and-comer Aflyin Spur who was consistently in the money with six wins and seven placings from 20 starts.

Category nominee Five Wise Men was also a non-winner during the season but he raced in the top company and won $62,200.

Love N The Port also won fewer races (two) and less money ($46,888) than Afyin Spur but earned his spot through placing on the last day of the season at Auckland in the Group III Greenlane Cup.

Sacred Mountain … a glaring omission in the four-year-old trotting mares’ category. PHOTO: Trish Dunell.The four-year-old trotting mares’ category is also missing one of the season’s stars in Sacred Mountain who was not deemed worthy of a nomination despite her five wins, four placings and $56,310 tally.

Among her outstanding performances was her third from 55 metres at Cambridge in October when she trotted a full second under the national mares’ record for 2200 metres.

Among the four horses named by HRNZ is southerner Simone Lindenny whose season record was two wins and $24,482.

Racing inferior horses than Sacred Mountain had to, she managed a win in an $8500 race at Gore and one at Addington in a $14,000 race.

Yet, because she ran third in a Group III race at Invercargill, which had six horses, one who took no part, she earned a nomination.

Similarly, though Peregrine won fewer races (four) and less money ($54,302) than Sacred Mountain, she was named on the short list because she placed in the same Group III race.

Before you jump to the wrong conclusion and infer that it’s just northern horses that were snubbed, check out the five-year-old and older trotting mares’ category.

At first sight Gold Chain (two wins, $55,144), I Dream Of Jeannie (four wins, $63,894), Ruby Ridge (three wins, $51,710) and The Bloss (four wins, $63,301) look fair chocies but, incredibly, the list omits two horses who won the most races and most money.

Eight-race winner snubbed

How could the HRNZ selection panel not include My Moment’s Now who was the only trotter of any age or sex to win eight races, only one fewer than the country’s leading trotters Sundees Son and Muscle Mountain?

She was the second top earner for the season in her category with $74,786 but did not have that HRNZ golden ticket of a placing in a Group race.

In the only one she contested, at Addington last November, she ran the third fastest time in the race but had to come from a prohibitive back mark of 30 metres. For most of the season she was handicapped on difficult marks.

The omission of the category’s highest earner is almost worse - Sioux Princess who earned $85,495 from seven wins and 13 placings.

But again she did not have any black type form, whereas placings got Ruby Ridge, The Bloss and I Dream Of Jeannie in.

HRNZ cannot argue it could not give recognition to those horses because of a limit in the number of nominations - in the five-year-old and older pacing mares’ division six horses are named and in the four-year-old entire or gelding section, five are finalists.

More extensive checks would surely reveal other owners peeved at their horse missing out on a nomination for the same reason, a situation HRNZ cannot ignore.

Communications and Marketing Co-ordinator Courtney Buchanan said the racing department checked through all horses’ performances but Group race/feature wins and placings were considered before overall performance (stakes, wins, placings).

Copy That scored back-to-back wins in the New Zealand Trotting Cup in November. PHOTO: Ajay Berry/Race Images.Three named in key category

Just three horses are named for the top five-year-old and older entire or gelding, Copy That, Self Assured and Spankem.

Spankem is a certain third-placegetter, just as his season was basically confined to the minor money with just one win and seven placings from 13 starts.

Copy That, robbed of a 2021 title because HRNZ deemed his New Zealand Cup win to be in a non-counting period with the switch to a calender year season, has to be the front-runner for the title.

After coming back from injury and four months’ confinement, he slayed his rivals again in the New Zealand Cup, with Self Assured only fifth, taking his restricted season record in New Zealand to five wins and two placings from seven starts. While getting fit for the cup, he added another win from four starts in Australia, for total earnings of $436,539.

Self Assured has weight of numbers on his side, however, having scored eight wins and seven placings from 17 starts. His wins included the Group I Auckland Cup and Group I NZ Free-for-all, neither race contested by Copy That. Of his $912,975 in earnings, $400,000 came from Cambridge’s slot race, The Race by Grins.

Award winners will be announced at Addington on March 4.