Trainer hopes to start new season with a bang after landing top title trifecta
Cannon Park trainer Stephen Massingham is hopeful of celebrating his third straight Cairns Jockey Club trainers’ premiership with more winners at the upcoming Cairns Cup and Cairns Amateurs racing carnivals.
News
Don't miss out on the headlines from News. Followed categories will be added to My News.
Cannon Park trainer Stephen Massingham is hopeful of celebrating his third straight Cairns Jockey Club trainers’ premiership with more winners at the upcoming Cairns Cup and Cairns Amateurs racing carnivals.
Massingham picked up his first Cairns trainers’ premiership in 2018-19 before claiming back-to-back titles last season.
He completed the trifecta by taking out the 2020-21 trainer-of-the-year prize, finishing the season with a double courtesy of runners Olinda and Canadian Rockies at Cairns on July 29. From 79 starters at Cannon Park last season, Massingham had a winning strike rate of just over 20 per cent with 16.5 wins.
The reigning trainers’ champion was hopeful he could start the new racing season with a bang at the upcoming carnivals, but wasn’t setting his expectations too high.
“It would be nice to start off with a couple of winners – I’ll be happy with one to start with,” he said.
Massingham expects to have “about 10 or 11” runners over the two days of the Cairns Cup racing carnival, to be held on August 21 and 28 – and said there could be a few “surprise packets” among them.
“Yeah, there could be,” he said.
“I’ve got a new one that arrived today and a couple of other new ones there.”
But the champion trainer wanted to “keep a lid on things” for now.
MORE NEWS:
Lions still kicking as league makes call on fixtures
Popham’s ready for Tokyo – no doubt about it
Cairns Cup will go ahead, says Jockey Club boss
Fixtures lost, seasons pushed back as Cairns leagues sidelined
“We’ve got to get there yet,” he said.
“The races aren’t on until next week so we’ve got to get past this week first but it’s something to look forward to. Hopefully I’ll have some nice runners over the carnival.”
Massingham will start Brilliant Mind in the Banana Cup at Innisfail this Saturday.
The Cassowary Coast track will hold its first TAB meeting since November with a six-race meeting, spearheaded by the Banana Cup.
Brilliant Mind has won three of his past six starts and finished second on another two occasions, including his latest effort when nosed out by the Sharlee D’Avila-trained Maquereau over 1500m at Cairns last month.
A son of So You Think, the six-year-old gelding has the right pedigree to be a Country Cups contender, being a half-brother to Chris Waller’s former topliners Funstar and Youngstar.
“If he runs well in the Banana Cup, he’ll probably head to the Cairns Cup,” Massingham said. “I think the step up to 1800m won’t affect him, so I expect him to run well.”
Roy Chillemi’s Robig was named horse of the year, winning four of his six starts at Cannon Park.
Wanderson D’Avila took home the jockey-of-the-year award, finishing just one win ahead of Nathan Day, while Krysten Swaffer claimed the apprentice jockey gong.
Originally published as Trainer hopes to start new season with a bang after landing top title trifecta
Queenslanders fall short as Cairns Tennis International finishes with a nailbiter
Arguably the best tennis match of the Cairns Tennis International was saved for the very last one of the tournament. READ ALL ABOUT THE FINALS HERE >>>
$13m on Friday, $20m on Monday: School cashes in on vote grab
Labor has thrown $20m at a Far North Queensland school just days after the LNP pledged $13m, with the cash splash sparking an inevitable war of words.