One of the proudest nights of Phil Williamson's career has come at a cost.
But the Kiwi trainer isn't letting that take the gloss off his Group1 double in the space of 35 minutes at Melton in Victoria on Saturday night.
Williamson produced Liberty Stride (3-year-old fillies) and Ultimate Stride (2-year-old boys) to record massive wins in their divisions of the Breeders Crown, the first winning by 19.4m — which seemed like a dramatic demolition job until Ultimate Stride nearly doubled that, winning his final by 37.8m after sitting parked.
That set up a Kiwi clean sweep of the only three trotting finals they contested at the rich Breeders Crown meeting. Kratos was a promoted winner of the A$80,000 3-year-old trot final after first-past-the-post All Cashed Up, who beat him by a nose, was relegated for galloping.
His win was the fifth Breeders Crown success for South Auckland trainer John Dickie but although he and son Josh had to have their little trotter trained to perfection to win, Williamson was still the star of the show.