At his hometown meeting and before a big crowd, trainer Brett Thompson landed the quinella in the Oatley Fine Wine Gulgong Cup (1200m) on Sunday and both horses were ridden by jockeys formerly from England.
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More Than Art (Billy Cray, 10) led most of the way to score by a length-and-a-half from the more favoured stablemate Attalea (James Rogers, $3.80) with two lengths to Desert Marshal (Luke Cumberland, $8), the winner of the Gulgong feature last year.
At the Cup presentation, Thompson made special mention of John ‘Ripper’ Currie, a part-owner of More Than Art, who has volunteered to care for the Gulgong track and helped the trainer with his large team of horses throughout the year.
Thompson, a multiple premiership winning trainer, had earlier supplied the first three placegetters in the Maiden Plate (1000m).
Named after Thompson’s granddaughter, Marley Girl (Alena Skerritt) was backed from $8 to $4.20 before leading throughout to win by nearly four lengths from Brimondo (Billy Cray, $5) and Starlight Treaty (James Rogers, $5).
The win was part of a hugely successful day for Sydney-based apprentice Skerritt.
A regular visitor to the Central West, Skerritt rode the winners of the first three races at Gulgong on Sunday.
After opening the day with victory onboard Oneoverfore ($9) for Dubbo trainer Garry Lunn before saluting with Thompson’s Marley Girl and I’m A Prima Donna ($10) trained by Samantha McDonald.
Winner of the Grenfell Picnics and Quambone Picnics, the Sharon Jeffries-trained Armedanddangerous (Tiffany Jeffries, $4.40) again set the pace when winning the Class 2 Handicap (1200m) from Poet’s Spirit ($3.70) and Beale Street ($3.20 favourite).
The day’s other winner was the Zaphod ($5), from the Narromine stables of Kylie Kennedy, who was ridden to victory by Ken Dunbar in the Benchmark 55 Handicap (1800m).
