Tony Gollan vows to be even better next season after breaking his own metropolitan training record

TONY Gollan toasted his record-breaking training performance with Bintang beers as he found one of the few sports bar in Bali showing Australian races.

Tony Gollan broke his own metropolitan record on Wednesday when Hi I’m Back gave the trainer his 79.5 winner of the season. Picture: Grant Peters Trackside Photography

TONY Gollan toasted his record-breaking training performance with Bintang beers as he found one of the few sports bar in Bali showing Australian races.

And the top Brisbane trainer, who broke his own metropolitan training record when Hi I’m Back saluted at Doomben on Wednesday, vowed to be even better next season.

“I’m certainly not going to just sit back and watch replays of my winners on TV,” Gollan told The Courier-Mail from Bali where he is on holiday. “I am always trying to improve our results.

“Just like I did at the end of last season, I am going to have a look back and identify what we could have done better.”

Last year Gollan bettered the late Bruce McLachlan’s longstanding Queensland record of 78 metro winners when he finished the racing season with 79 metro winners.

His dominance of Brisbane’s training ranks has stepped up a notch and he now has 79.5 winners this season after his latest Doomben winner.

Jim Byrne steers Hi I’m Back to victory at Doomben on Wednesday. Picture: Grant Peters Trackside Photography

He is also closing in on preparing 100 overall winners in a season for the first time.

Gollan’s training performance has been even more meritorious considering Eagle Farm training facilities have been either out of action or substandard for most of the season.

By his own admission, he would like to be a bigger force in next year’s Queensland Winter Carnival. But the former Toowoomba boy reckons he is on the right track to future winter carnival glory.

“We had a great summer carnival but the winter carnival was a little bit disappointing because we were just off those top-grade horses,’’ Gollan said. “But it has been a difficult training regime with everything that has been happening at Eagle Farm.

“We have a large team of horses with great support from a wonderful group of owners. It is a matter of identifying the young horses which are coming through which we think can go to the next level.”

Originally published as Tony Gollan vows to be even better next season after breaking his own metropolitan training record