It was one big party at Ruakaka yesterday when the Whangarei Racing Club threw a 50th birthday bash local trainer Donna Logan will never forget.
Renowned for her loyalty, generosity as well as success in the racing world, the WRC felt it the right time to make the Ruakaka- based trainer
a life member of the club during the second of the Summer Festival Ruakaka Race Days.
Logan, who trains with partners Dean Logan and Chris Gibbs, said the celebration, the life member presentation and race five - named Donna Logan's 50th Birthday Celebration 1400m - came completely out the blue.
"I had absolutely no idea any of this was going on ... I thought they would get me - but maybe on the weekend, not on a work day like today," she said.
Fellow trainers, Logan Stable's clients from all over the country, friends that she had not seen for a long time and her children Samantha, 19, and Robert, 14, were on hand to help the trainer - who kickstarted her lifetime in racing as an apprentice jockey in 1976 - celebrate the milestone.
"I was really overwhelmed when I walked upstairs to the function room and there everyone was - I cried actually. I really didn't expect this ... they got me.
"Usually it's me organising something like this to get someone else, but they got me back," she said.
She added it was only when Samantha waved the race book in front of her on Tuesday that she clicked that race five was named after her.
And the day truly did belong to Logan, when Mawah Vellous - a horse in which she is a part-owner and trains - ran home strongly to win race three, the j9@breamrealty 1200m with Matthew Cameron aboard.
In addition, Ace High, owned by Logan's children and ridden by Trudy Thornton, won the Stella Artois 2200m, race four, and the Logan Stables also had several placings in other races throughout the day.
