Memories Of Clear Away At Gelligaer Steeplechases

TUFTS OF THE  WELSH TURF By Brian Lee

Bookmakers at the Gelligaer Farmers Hunt Steeplechases in 2004 were hit for six when reigning Welsh champion point-to-point rider Tim Vaughan, now a leading Welsh trainer, landed a massive gamble in winning a confined maiden race on seven-year-old Clear Away.

The horse’s owner, Andrew Lowrie from Barry, had paid 5,500 guineas for Clear Away at the August 2002 Doncaster Sales, but the horse  developed niggling injuries. 

Lowrie and his wife, Jill, had to wait two years before they had a return on their investment.

Aberthin trainer Tim Vaughan. Pic: Getty Images.

Trained by the winning jockey’s then girlfriend  and now wife Abbi Johns, Clear Away romped home as they say by a distance from Dunmanus Sound after being backed from 8-1 to 5-4 favourite in a field of 13 runners.

Abbi, then aged 22, who had won the Countryside Alliance Charity Flat race at Chepstow Racecourse on Doc Ryans three days earlier, said: “This is the first winner I have trained for someone other than myself and I am really delighted.”

Unfortunately, the bookies at Bonvilston didn’t share in that delight.

Jockey Richard Johnson (Photo by Nick Potts/PA Images via Getty Images)

Three of the seven races at Hereford racecourse on Tuesday (October 16 2018) were won by horses trained in Wales.

Marble Moon, a six-year-old trained by Evan Williams at Llancarfan in the Vale of Glamorgan, made it four wins on the bounce when landing the Harrison Clark Rickerbys Handicap Hurdle with stable jockey Adam Wedge in the saddle.

The opening EquestrianProjects.Co.Uk Handicap Hurdle went to the 11-4 favourite Arty Campbell, ridden by champion jockey Richard Johnson and trained by Bargoed’s Bernard Llewellyn.

Pembrokeshire’s Rebecca Curtis had a welcome winner when her Drovers Lane, an 11-2 chance, partnered by A P Heskin, came home nine lengths ahead of the odds-on favourite Cresswell Legend in the EquestrianProjects For Gallops Chase.