Mark Webb’s plan to re-establish himself as the state’s leading trainer of two-year-olds will get off to a solid start in the first juvenile race of the Queensland season at Toowoomba.
The Toowoomba Turf Club has planned a large promotional day on Sunday to honour the late course race caller Pat O’Shea who died two years ago.
There will be seven different callers at the meeting including RadioTAB’s David Fowler, Sky Channel’s Josh Fleming and former Dubai caller Terry Spargo, who is now back in Queensland.
Webb has four of the 10 acceptances for the main race, the Pat O’Shea Plate (1000m), Queensland’s first two-year-old race of the season.
He will have Dancing Diva, Sujani, Trezoro and Acceptita in the race but will keep his recent trial winners Bolter, Aetherius and Miss Ester for another day.
“We have 18 two-year-olds in total and they are just about all owned by the Optima Racing syndicates,” Webb said.
“Earlier this year we got rid of a lot of our older horses and decided to concentrate on the babies. Alan Newcombe who heads Optima is keen to get a really good horse.
“The way to do that is buy well-bred stock and then give them their chance on the racetrack.”
Webb has won dozens of two-year-old races in the past three decades with horses such as Black Minx, Emit Time, Foolish, Tripitz, Wicked Temptation and Acceptile.
Liam Birchley who has made a habit of winning the Toowoomba race under its various names has Awesome Mo in this year’s event.
