John Dunn driving Heisenberg, with the pair hoping for more success at Addington tonight. Photo / Race Images
John Dunn wants to achieve something that hasn’t been done in modern harness racing, but even if he pulls it off he won’t get his name in the record books for it.
The man who could rightly lay claim to being the most important horseperson in New Zealand harness racing also reckons he will only achieve half his dream anyway.
Dunn aspires to winning the trainers’ and drivers’ premierships this year, with the harness racing season running from January 1 to December 31.
Approaching the halfway stage, he has a great shot at both, kind of.
There are two small issues: he isn’t officially a horse trainer and to win the drivers’ premiership he has to beat Blair Orange.
Let’s start with the first issue.
Dunn is the boss of the Canterbury stable which runs under the names of Robert (his father) and Jenna (John’s wife).
While they do plenty of work, with Robert based more in the North Island, John is the main trainer despite the stable being set up as Robert and Jenna Dunn and branded as Diamond Racing.
Nothing untoward in that.
Everybody who knows harness racing is aware John runs things, but he believes Jenna, who is an integral part of the stable, should have her name on the paperwork too.
It works because Diamond Racing went into last night’s Alexandra Park meeting with a 23-win lead over Steve and Amanda Telfer on the trainers’ premiership and John is committed to winning the title again.
“We absolutely want to win it again and I think we have the numbers to do it,” says Dunn,
“Not only do we want to win it for ourselves and the owners but Dad (Robert) is good mates with Steve Stockman [owner of Stonewall Stud, who the Telfers train for] and they enjoy ribbing each other about it.
“So the trainers’ premiership is a priority.”
Winning the drivers’ premiership would give John more official recognition and put him in two clubs: one, an (unofficial) winner of both premierships in the same season, and two, a champion alongside his brother Dexter, who has won 10 driving premierships.
When Dexter moved to the United States, Orange took over the driving premiership domination and John isn’t sure he can wrest it away from his friend.
John recently drove seven winners on an Addington card and took the premiership lead, Orange came back by driving five at an Invercargill meeting a few days later so they head to Addington tonight with Orange leading by two.
“Blair will be bloody hard to beat,” admits Dunn.
“I think I am driving well enough and I’d love to win it but I can’t travel as much as Blair.
“I predominantly have to be here to train horses and most of my big books of drives are at Canterbury meetings whereas I had to watch Blair pop down to Southland and drive five winners just like that.
“And, of course, we all know he is a great driver.
“But if I am hanging in there come the back end of the season I will be prepared to travel to give me the best chance of winning it.”
Team Dunn takes their usual strong team to Addington tonight where Dunn rates their best chances as Follow Your Dream (R3, No 5) and Miki’s Courage (R8, No 7).
“They are both racing well and haven’t finished winning yet,” he says.
Old favourite Heisenberg is the best horse in race seven and in great form, with Dunn only wary of his 30m handicap.
“It’s only a small field so he can still win but a lot will depend on how they run the race,” says Dunn.
Another horse better than winter-grade racing tonight is Tectonic (R6, No 3) who has won his last two since returning from a long spell and looks to have the natural ability to work his way toward open class.
Michael Guerin wrote his first nationally published racing articles while still in school and started writing about horse racing and the gambling industry for the Herald as a 20-year-old in 1990. He became the Herald’s Racing Editor in 1995 and covers the world’s biggest horse racing carnivals.