Ken Casellas | Photo: Hamilton Content Creators
Four-year-old gelding Strike Team, whose life was in danger twice earlier this year when rushed to hospital for emergency surgery, has made a wonderful recovery and he resumed after a nine-month absence in a blaze of glory with a dashing victory at Gloucester Park on Friday night.
Bred and owned by prominent Serpentine breeder Mike Howie in partnership with his wife Sharon and his mother Mary, Strike Team looks set for many more wins after his all-the-way success in the 2130m $1 Million Slot Race in April Pace.
“About a week after finishing third in a race at Pinjarra early last March Strike Team suffered a colic attack and had to be rushed from Capel to Murdoch Hospital for emergency surgery when about a metre of his bowel was cut out,” said 60-year-old Mike Howie.
“A complication set in about three weeks later and Strike Team had to return to hospital for further surgery where some more bowel was cut. I then gave him three months off, and he has made a full recovery.”
Howie worked Strike Team for three months at his Serpentine property before sending the gelding back to his trainer Aiden De Campo in Capel.
“The horse has plenty of ability and is one of Aiden’s favourites,” said Howie. Strike Team started from the coveted No. 1 barrier on Friday night and was the $1.70 favourite. He led for the first 100m before being passed by $81 outsider Heza Head Honcho, and 150m later De Campo sent Strike Team back into the lead.
After a fast lead time of 36.6sec. Strike Team relaxed with quarters of 30.7sec., 30.5sec. and 30.1sec. before he sprinted over the final 400m in 28.7sec. and won by a length and a half from $4.60 chance Miss Serenade, who fought on gamely after racing in the breeze.
Strike Team’s comeback triumph adds yet another chapter to Howie’s remarkable career in harness racing, which began when he was an 18-year-old clerk with the R and I Bank in Narrogin.
“It was then that I went to the WA yearling sale in 1980 with my grandfather Joe Coverley,” said Howie. “I wanted to buy a Renaud filly and was willing to pay $500 for her. I finished up buying her for $1000 and named her Renaud Express, who won seven or eight races for me on country tracks. I drove her and her best win was in a Wagin Cup.
This was the start of Howie’s involvement in harness racing, and, remarkably, Strike Team’s pedigree traces back in an unbroken line to Renaud Express, with Howie breeding a succession of successful race mares and brood mares — Copper Strike, Red Hot Copper, Copper Beach Girl and Topless Beach Girl.
Topless Beach Girl (by Art Major) managed one win (at Pinjarra in August 2015) and ten placings for $21,810 from 21 starts. Her first foal is Strike Team, who has had 33 starts for nine wins, ten placings and $69,531 in prizemoney.
Her second foal is The Miki Taker, winner of the Group 1 Pearl Classic for two-year-olds in June 2021 and boasts a fine record of 20 starts for eight wins, eight placings and $146,160. Topless Beach Girl’s third foal is Insta Gator, a two-year-old colt by Huntsville who led and won on debut at Pinjarra last Monday for trainer-driver Madeliene Young.
Renaud Express produced Copper Strike, who raced 61 times for 13 wins, 12 placings and $91,644) before she produced Red Hot Copper (one win from eight starts) and the dam of Copper Beach Girl, who raced 84 times for 14 wins, 24 placings and stakes of $156,851, with her biggest success being in the Group 3 WASBA Breeders Stakes at Gloucester Park in May 2011.
Copper Beach Girl’s first foal is Topless Beach Girl, and her only other foal is Bettor Be Oscar, who has raced 105 times for 18 wins, 44 placings and $247,089. He won 15 races for De Campo in WA, and his three most recent wins have been at Yonkers in New York.
The thousand dollars outlaid by 18-year-old Howie 42 years ago has proved to be an amazing investment.