Pursuit of birdies and eagles aside, a group of young professional golfers are on course for continued success with their first racing venture with promising four-year-old Frozen Rope.
The Adam Duggan-trained gelding, with two wins and two placings from five starts, is set to resume in the All-Pro Racing Syndicates Class 2 Hcp (1312m) at Taree on Monday.
It was a chance meeting during a golf tournament in Canberra that eventually led to the group racing the son of King Of Prussia.
The syndicate includes brothers Grant, Brad and Steve Binns, cousin Chris Binns and Brett Dale, the son of Australian Turf Club starter, Bill Dale.
“I’ve been mates with a lot of the boys for some time, especially Grant (Binns), who went to school with Josh Parr,” Gosford-based Duggan said.
“We’d talked about forming a syndicate to race a horse for some time and Grant rang from a tournament in Canberra saying he’d met a bloke from Melbourne that had two King Of Prussias for sale.
“Grant was really excited. Anyway, I told him I wasn’t prepared to go into anything sight unseen.
“Frozen Rope was sent up from Melbourne and I liked him straight away after I worked him. He was a very big horse with a lot of scope.
“We eventually agreed to race him on lease.”
After a couple of months of having the horse in work, Duggan told the syndicate they had a pretty nice horse on our hands.
His prediction proved spot on.
“He was a big bugger and on debut I decided to use pacifiers,” Duggan said.
“He kept chasing on a heavy track to run third to Embarrassed at Gosford.
“At Hawkesbury (May 12) next start, let’s just say there were a few navigation problems (eighth, beaten 9.8 lengths).
Frozen Rope then won a 1500m maiden at Port Macquarie by five lengths on June 6 before bolting in by a whopping 8.3 lengths over 1600m at Wyong on a heavy track ten days later.
“We thought he’d win but not by that margin,” Duggan said.
Frozen Rope was spelled for 164-days after a long neck second to subsequent city winner Com-ear over 2100m at Gosford on June 24.
“He’s definitely developed, matured, muscled up and starting to fill out into his large frame, Duggan said. I’ve given him two trials. He’s going good.
“The boys are loving what happening, they’ve been spoilt with their first horse. They’ve even got caps printed up.
“This horse is exciting, he’s got that bit of brilliance, a real good turn of foot.
AAP TURF
