By BARRY STREET
Conditioning racehorses for winter jumping races and tough slogs through heavy ground takes expertise.
Jumps maestro Ken Browne, of Cambridge, and his wife, Ann, have the knack.
So does another Cambridge man, Roger McGlade, as he underlined on Saturday by winning back-to-back 2000m races at Te Rapa with No Fibs and the little-fancied His Destiny.
McGlade proved 16 years ago that he was a superb conditioner.
In those days he was a little-known trainer in Taupo who had claimed hometown glory by winning a Taupo Cup with Stylish Dude.
But, to the surprise of many city slickers, McGlade then reproduced Stylish Dude - a supposed 2000m specialist - for an upset win in the 3200m Auckland Cup at Ellerslie.
His next major feat, after upgrading to Cambridge in the mid-1980s, was winning the group one New Zealand 2000 Guineas at Riccarton and eight other races with Krona.
Against a great many odds, a 4-year-old Krona was readied by McGlade with only a couple of sprint races in the Waikato for one of the features of the 1989 Melbourne Cup carnival at Flemington.
The race was the group one Honda Mile, in which Krona went down by only a nose.
But for being left in front too soon, Krona probably would never have been nabbed on the line by one of Australia's greatest gallopers, Better Loosen Up, to whom he conceded 4.5kg.
Never one to train more than a handful of horses, McGlade these days busies himself with a team of seven including three of the progeny of Krona.
It came as a major surprise on Saturday when His Destiny, a six-year-old by Krona and a winner of only two races, outstayed some much better performed rivals in the restricted-open Le Destin 2000.
Not in McGlade's mind, though.
"It wasn't much of a field, and I knew he was ready for it," he said. "Besides, there was no other suitable race for him for at least two or three weeks."
There was a question mark about McGlade's other winner.
"No Fibs had won a 2000m maiden fresh-up at Te Awamutu [on May 31]," he explained.
"She is one of the smallest horses racing - not even 15 hands - just all heart.
"Because there is not that much of her, there had to be a double about whether she would back up a second time after a break from racing of nearly seven months.
"It was especially good to see her deliver."
The main flag bearer of McGlade's team, Classic Spirit, recently missed out on a Cornwall Handicap bid at Ellerslie because of a stone bruise.
But the horse is now over that and seems likely, on trials form, to be a chance in the $40,000 Kiwifruit Cup, a listed 2170m, at Tauranga next Saturday week.
That same day His Destiny will probably line up again in a premier-quality 2100m at Tauranga.
Mighty midget No Fibs's best chance of a hat-trick, in her trainer's view, could be back in the conditions she favours in a class two 2100m at the Cambridge Jockey Club's meeting at Te Rapa on June 28.
Racing: Winning touch in tough slog to the fore again
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