Saturday night at Burwood Park sees the 55th running of the Grafton Electric’s Northam Pacing Cup.
The race was first run in April 1962 and won by the Jack Jones...
The race was first run in April 1962 and won by the Jack Jones trained and driven Minton Hall and the subsequent winners reads like a Whos Who of local trotting.
Champions including Blue Pennant (1968), Tanaka (1973), Sinn Fein (1982 & 1983), Morgan James (1986) and Zakara (1992 & 1993) all have their names on the Northam Cup Honour roll.
Gary Hall Snr, who trained his seventh Fremantle Cup winner last Friday night with Chicago Bull, has trained seven previous winners of the Northam Cup including dual winner Zakara.
The only other trainers with more than a solitary win in the Northam Cup have been Tom Charles, Phil Coulson, Greg Harper and Kevin Keys who have each trained two winners of the race.
Gary Hall Jnr has driven six winners of the Northam Cup with no other driver having won the race more than twice. The support race on Saturday night’s programme is the Village Kid Sprint which was inaugurated in 2004 and this year marks the 14th running of the race.
The race honours one of Western Australia’s truly great horses and fittingly the most successful driver in the race’s history is Chris Lewis who was at the reins for 88 of Village Kid’s 90 wins in Australia.
Chris Lewis has driven three winners of the Village Kid Sprint including Formyeyesonly last year for trainer Kristian Hawkins.
On New Years Eve at Bunbury Chris Lewis drove his 5000th winner behind the appropriately named I'm The Best and he joins Victorians Gavin Lang and Chris Alford as the only drivers to pass the milestone in Australia.
Of his 5000 wins, 439 have been at Burwood Park stretching back to Cain in September 1980. Cain was trained by Lewis’s father Allen. Village Kid’s trainer Bill Horn and his wife Norma will be in attendance at Burwood Park this Saturday night.
