Justin Prentice on the lawn at Gloucester Park last night after Dracarys gave him his 500th win as a trainer Photo by Hamilton Content Creators
When diminutive mare Dracarys won at Gloucester Park last night she brought up win number 500 for her 31yo trainer Justin Prentice.
He is just the 33rd trainer in the 110 year history of harness racing in Perth to reach the 500 wins milestone as a trainer and it has taken him just 11 years of training.
Justin’s move into the training ranks came after a shortage of driving opportunities after he outdrove is junior drivers concession.
His first winner as a trainer was Hes A Ruler at Narrogin on 21st October 2008 and it has taken him just 11 years to reach the 500 wins benchmark.
Some idea of the magnitude of his achievement can be gauged by looking at the records of the only four Western Australians to train 2000 winners.
Gary Hall Snr took 25 years to train the first 500 of the more than 3000 winners he currently has to his name.
Ross Olivieri took 15 years to get his first 500 and went to New Zealand and New South Wales in the process.
Trevor Warwick’s first 500 training wins came in 14 years of training while dual-code training legend Fred Kersley took 19 years to get to the 500 wins mark.
Prentice’s 500 training wins includes 16 at Group One level with the 2019 WA Pacing Cup at the head of the list.
He has also trained three winners of the WA Oaks, two 2yo Diamond Classics and a 2yo Pearl Classic.