Ken Casellas | Photo: PACEPIX
Up-and-coming young reinsman Toby Lynn completed his second double in metropolitan-class events when he was rewarded for his patience with an exciting fast-finishing win with veteran pacer Joey James in the $21,000 BOTRA Thanks Lovick Fabrication Pace at Gloucester Park on Friday night.
In contrast to his first winner on the night, Candy Apple who set the pace and scored an easy victory, Joey James, a $9.70 chance from the outside of the back line, was handled perfectly by the 24-year-old Lynn, who was able to get the gelding across to race four back on the pegs in seventh position while the $2 favourite and polemarker Our Thunder was setting the pace.
Joey James was under lock and key in the back straight in the final circuit before Lynn was able to ease him off the pegs approaching the home turn. Joey James then was switched three wide on the corner and he surged home to get up and snatch a head victory from Our Thunder, who extended his losing sequence to 64.
The victory was a family affair. Joey James was bred and is owned by Lynn’s mother Katrina and is trained by his father Brad. Joey James has proved to be a wonderful gift horse, who has earned $151,853 from 12 wins and 28 placings from 118 starts.
Mrs Lynn bred Joey James from a free stallion service to unfashionable American sire Heartland Hanover, and the gelding’s dam, the unraced Bettors Delight mare Soho Honolulu, was a gift to the Lynn family when it was decided that she was not good enough to race.
It is in Soho Honolulu’s favour that she is a half-sister to Im Sir Blake, who has amassed $515,026 in prizemoney from 14 Victorian wins and another 20 victories in the United States.
Soho Honolulu’s dam is Jupiters Darling, who won the Sales Classic for two-year-old fillies in February 2005 and was retired with earnings of $142,720 from 14 wins and 22 placings from 84 starts.