HEADLINE HORSE TESTS VANDYKE’S INNER PEACE
DAVID Vandyke and Alligator Blood are racing’s compelling contradiction.
The Queensland trainer craves the peaceful life while his four-year-old gelding appears to court controversy.
After making news in racing for more than year a now, they can be the headline act again by winning the $7.5 million Golden Eagle (1500m) at Rosehill on Saturday.
Vandyke said Alligator Blood had come along at a good time in his career.
“In some ways, Alligator Blood has been a blessing and shows that I haven’t drifted off into the wilderness,’’ Vandyke said.
It was only four years ago when Vandyke gambled with his career by closing his Warwick Farm stables in Sydney and relocating to the Sunshine Coast.
At the time, the trainer was riding the crest of a wave having just prepared his first Group 1 winner with Yankee Rose in the ATC Sires Produce Stakes.
If Vandyke had stayed on at Warwick Farm, it would be reasonable to expect he could have built on the success he was having with Yankee Rose and potentially attract more owners and better quality horses to his stables.
Instead, Vandyke packed up and moved to Queensland. He was too young to retire so what was the motivation when his training career was reaching new heights?
“I guess there was in some ways selfish motives because I felt there was a greater level of peace out there for me,’’ Vandyke said.
“I certainly feel I have improved my lifestyle moving up to the Sunshine Coast.”
He says he now knows what he needs to do to find peace in any situation.
Vandyke has needed to rely on these skills during Alligator Blood’s successful but often tumultuous threeyear-old season.
“This has been an incredibly turbulent, testing year,’’ he said. “The last time we planned to run Alligator Blood at Rosehill we had to scratch him just before the race because he fell apart, there was the disqualification from the Magic Millions Guineas and then COVID hit.
“But through it all I’ve found a level of peace. I feel I’m in a better place than I have been for most of my life.”
But successive defeats to start Alligator Blood’s fouryear-old season are providing more testing times for Vandyke going into the Golden Eagle, Sydney’s second richest race.
“I think his two runs have been pass marks keeping in mind his ‘Grand Final’ is the Golden Eagle,’’ Vandyke said.