Steve Turnbull has won almost all of harness racing's big trophies, but Australia's richest race for maidens had eluded him, until yesterday.
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Turnbull claimed Eugowra's $30,600 Canola Cup on Monday afternoon when pre-race favourite Oh I Am One led from start to finish over 2100 metres.
Driven by Turnbull's daughter Amanda, Oh I Am The One won by a massive 27.5m with a track record time of 2.32.7, a mile rate of 1.57.0 minutes.
The four-year-old gelding drew barrier one for the Lexus of Parramatta sponsored final, and was the clear favourite after an impressive heat win last Sunday week.
Owner Craig White, who like Turnbull hails from The Lagoon, said it was particularly pleasing that his horse had provided a breakthrough win for his good mate.
"I've won a couple of other big [races] with Steve and Jenny [wife of the trainer] but Steve said he'd never won this one, so to be part of a special win today is very good," White said after the presentation.
"This is such a hard race to win."
Oh I Am The One didn't appear to do it hard on Monday, but the record time suggested otherwise.
After getting the best start of the 10-horse field Oh I Am The One never surrendered the lead, despite early challenges from Allnight Raid, trained by Bernie Hewitt, and Tullow, trained and driven by Brad Hewitt.
The Ken Rue (Canowindra) trained Lucy Lamb also provided a challenge but was unable to match the winner's scorching pace, racing outside the leader for most of the journey.
The only horse to stand a chance in the end was Tullow, who ran a distant second, while roughie Swaggie Shannon was another 9m back in third.
Craig White was effusive in his praise for the Eugowra club, and admitted he didn't know the small town even had a trotting track on previous visits.
"I've only ever driven through Eugowra before and I didn't even know they had a track here," he said in the post-race presentation.
"It's good to see a small community do this - it's unbelievable," he said.
Meanwhile, the 2013 Canola Cup winner Holy Camp Clive, trained and driven by Robert Anderson, won the $10,200 Pepper Tree Farm / Don Tildsley Memorial yesterday.