Kerryn Manning - 2021 Tatlow Stakes win on Plymouth Chubb. Photo by Stuart McCormick
FOR all the remarkable things trailblazing driver Kerryn Manning has achieved, winning Saturday night’s Inter Dominion Trotting Final on Plymouth Chubb could top it all.
It’s a big call when you consider she became just the second female to drive a Group 1 winner in Europe on Knight Pistol in Norway in 1997, teamed with Arden Rooney to be the first female driver to win the iconic NZ Cup in 2015 and has smashed just about every Aussie driving record.
But this race runs deep. It’s family. It’s emotion-charge and it’s potentially a comeback story – both driver and horse – for the ages.
Manning has endured a year to forget, spending about six weeks sidelined with three broken vertebrae from a fall at the Horsham trials in late July.
Not long after returning, another fall at Melton on October 7 left her four fractures in a wrist and cost her a string of feature race drives, including Plymouth Chubb through the heats of this Brisbane Inter Dominion.
It was only last Wednesday she finally got the all-clear to return to driving and started to get excited about reuniting with Plymouth Chubb, who is trained by her father, Peter. Kerryn has driven the trotter in 16 of his 19 wins.
“It’s been a long haul back,” Manning said. “At first I was mis-diagnosed and they thought I only had one fracture, but they found another three a couple of weeks later. It’s been touch-and-go if I’d be back in time.
“I’ve been watching him through the series and Dad’s done a great job getting him fit after all the issues he’s had, too.”
Like Manning, who boasts over 4200 winners and 39 at Group 1 level, Plymouth Chubb has been plagued by injuries.
After 14 successive wins as a two-year-old, Plymouth Chubb fractured a pastern bone in a hind leg and had surgery to insert four screws. He didn’t race for almost nine months.
Just as Peter Manning was getting him back to his best, the injury flared again in February, this year.
“Out he went again, for another four months rest,” he said.
“I only got him back to the races a month before the Inter Dominion started, but still had it in mind to have a crack at the Inter Dominion if I was happy enough with him.
“He had two runs at home, but it was really only his final workout before I had to travel up when I decided we’d come to Brisbane. He worked the fastest mile he ever has at home.
“His stable name is Chubby and that’s how he looks, but all his runs up here have been great. He’s come through the (three) heats well and should only get better for the final.”
Plymouth Chubb, with NSW young gun Cam Hart as stand-in driver, followed a sparkling opening night with terrific seconds to big guns Just Believe and Queen Elida in the second and third round heats.
The gelding is a $14 chance from the back row (gate 10) against globetrotting superstar and $1.5 favourite Just Believe, but it’s remarkable both Plymouth Chubb and Manning are in the race..
Who says they can’t defy the odds again and win it?
· Adam Hamilton is a paid contributor writing on harness racing for News Corp.
