Hurrell brings confidence to Oamaru

By Jonny Turner

Driver Mark Hurrell does not plan to leave the fate of his leading hopes to chance at Oamaru on Wednesday.

Hurrell will combine again with Jonique, who is out to make it three wins from her last four starts in race 8.

Though her recent winning run ended in a last start eighth at Ashburton, the five-year-old still produced a sound effort to finish just over two lengths from the winner, Senorita Margarita.

“It didn’t really go how I wanted it to go, just everything went wrong,” Hurrell said.

“So we just put a line through it, but she only finished a couple of lengths from the winner after being three-wide for most of the way.”

Hurrell has full faith Jonique can bounce back to winning form in Wednesday’s race.

“We are pretty confident with her on Wednesday.”

“She is probably the best horse in the race and we will probably drive her like that, too.”

“She would need some pretty bad luck to stop her I would think.”

Hurrell combines with Pete’s Dash in race 6 following his second in an amateur drivers race at Addington.

The reinsman hopes the pacer can bring that kind of form to Oamaru after he ran a less impressive fifth in his prior outing at Forbury Park.

“He went good in the amateurs’ race last week,” Hurrell said.

“He didn’t go as good at Forbury before that, but I probably drove him a bit hard.”

“I sort of tried to break the rest of them, but he just got found wanting that last little bit.”

Hurrell hopes to make full use of Pete’s Dash’s barrier 2 draw on Wednesday.

“He is the same as Jonique, really.”

“We will try to be pretty positive, I don’t think anything else would be good enough to take me on too much.”

“I would say he is my best chance of the day.”

Hurrell again combines with Ultimate Sassenach in race 3.

The five-year-old has been a consistent performer over summer and looks set to go another strong race despite clashing with the hot favourite American Lightning.

“I think American Lightning would have to do things wrong for me to beat him, to be honest.”

“But she is going good races, she ran second to Tres Chic, who has come out and won again.”

Hurrell reunites with Owes Me Dough following his second to Magic Sign in his last start at Forbury.

The reinsman can not see why the four-year-old will not put in another bold effort in race 5.

“He was pretty good at Forbury.”

“He was disappointing in his first start, he didn’t appreciate the grit and we changed some things.”

“He ran home quite nice at Forbury, he probably lacks a little bit of speed.”

“But if he gets the right run he is probably as good as any of them in that field.”

“There are probably four or five equal chances in that.”

Hurrell also drives Son Of Majestic (race 1) and Deborah’s Gem (race 7), who both look outside place chances.