Dale has a day out

By Brad Kingsbury
CONSISTENT country jockey Dale Smith proved his value with a treble on the Pakenham Cup undercard during Sunday’s feature race day.
Pakenham Racing Club officials were pleased with the quality of entries for its biggest day of racing for the year and Smith made the most of his highclass engagements, booting home the winners of races two, three and four.
All three were trained by leading Caulfield mentor Mick Price.
The track was officially rated a ‘dead 4’ but several jockeys commented that it was on the worse side of the rating after the first race.
That did not stop Smith guiding $2.50 favourite Red Hot Ruby to the line with ease in race two and then following it up by steaming home down the outside to win on Boardroom Bandits ($1.80 favourite) in the next race.
If anything, his win on $2.80 favourite Divine Princess in the fourth race was the easiest of all after it bolted clear of its rivals on the turn and won by two lengths.
Smith was thrilled after the third success, but said he thought they were all good chances.
“Boardroom Bandits is a big striding horse and I just wanted to give him some room and balance up. That worked okay,” he said.
“Divine Princess can run. I had a great association with her mother (Divine Hope) and it looks like the traits have been passed on. She relaxed well (but) of all of them, Red Hot Ruby felt like the fastest and that’s how it turned out.”
Smith did not have a mount in the cup but had one other ride during the meeting on unplaced, locally trained galloper My Pleasure in the fifth race.
Nar Nar Goon jockey Vlad Duric rode Agitation to victory for Sharyn Peters in the Showcase Class 4 Handicap and followed that up with three placings on an unlucky afternoon.
During a postrace television interview, Duric sent a message to Cranbourne jockey and good friend Malcolm Pay who is recovering from a major spinal operation after a fall in Singapore.
Seymour trainer David Bourne prepared the winners of the two feature races on the program, while other trainers to taste success on the day included Cliff Brown, Robbie Laing and David Racovolis.
On the downside, few visiting trainers made it to the track on Sunday due to a clash with the William Inglis yearling sales in Westmeadows.
That mattered little to the 5000strong crowd who attended the meeting, and club racing manager Michael Hodge was happy with the day.
“So much effort goes into staging a day like this so it’s great to see it come together and work so well,” he said. “That’s a reward in itself for the staff that have worked long and hard to make it happen.
“The crowd was up by 500 or six hundred on last year and bar profits were up a staggering 58 percent. They were certainly thirsty,” he said.
Hodge was thrilled with the day’s racing, in particular the cup and paid tribute to his hardworking office staff led by Michelle Tones and Nicola Meehl, together with track manager Brendan Short for again preparing a superior and even racing surface.
He also announced that the Pakenham club had agreed to stage the meeting set down for Moe on Sunday, after the Moe track was deemed unsuitable to race on due to the recent installation of sand slits.