Mark: Give me a stable full of Tommys - he’s everything you could ask for in a racehorse

Trainer Mark Dux declared he’d love a stable-full of horses like Tommy Lincoln after the warhorse scored his eighth, and arguably best, win in Queensland on Saturday night.

Sent to the front by driver Mathew Neilson, Tommy Lincoln reeled off brutal closing sectionals of 28.69, 26.81 and 27.99 which put paid to the challenge of hot favourite Blacksadance, scoring by 3.4 metres for the 16th win of his career.

“Blacksadance is the best one going round up here at the moment but Matthew said he could see he was in trouble, starting to struggle before the turn.”

Dux told Neilson before the race “not to die wondering”, to go forward and play it by ear, depending on when Blacksadance came looking.

“He got a nice easy lead and when the other horse only came late he hadn’t done a heap of work so he let him roll along and got the others off the bit and chasing.

Mathew Neilson gets Tommy home after a perfect drive.“Blacksadance normally gets up and eyeballs you but he would have gone a quick quarter to just get beside us so when Tommy threw in a 26.8 third quarter it would have taken a bit out of him.

“Mathew said Tommy was strong to the line and he was never going to get beaten.”

Dux described Tommy as “a good, honest, professional who does his thing week in and week out, comes home and licks the bowl. Unless something goes wrong, or he gets a bad trip, he seldom misses a cheque.

“You can’t ask for much more than that in a racehorse. I’d like a stable full of Tommys.”

Dux said you could read nothing into the fact Tommy went winless for 23 starts and has now scored back-to-back wins.

“If you go through his record he’s missed a top five placing only four times in his last 16 starts. It all comes down to barrier draws and run of race because it’s so competitive up here - the sectionals they’re running are on a par with anywhere else.”

Tommy Lincoln was not like Blacksadance, winner of six of his last 10 starts, who can sit parked and still win.

“Tommy can park and still race well, so long as he doesn’t over-race, but he gets tired in the last 100 and runs fourth.

“But you know he’s going to be competitive every week.”

Tommy Lincoln goes all the way to beat Gleneagle Warrior, markers, and Blacksadance.Dux wondered if the recent spell of hot weather in Brisbane affected Blacksadance on Saturday night.

“When you race tough like he does week in and week out it has to catch up to you, especially in our heat. We’ve had so many hot days and it’s still hot at night.

“At 4.30am this morning the sweat was running off me. The horses had only light sheets on and it was all wet under them.

“It’s 8am now, I’ve just brought them in from the paddock to hose them, and it’s already 28 degrees and the humidity is 90 percent. The sand in the stalls is wet from the humidity.”

Tommy Lincoln will race again next Saturday night, along with Captain Nemo.

“When you race every week you don’t have to do much with them in between, it’s pretty straight forward.

“He’ll need a break at some stage if he’s to run in the better races but, while he’s healthy and well, I’ll keep him ticking over.”

Tommy Lincoln has now won $97,515 from eight wins in New Zealand and A$95,008 from eight in Queensland for Lincoln Farms’ owners John and Lynne Street and their partnership of Shannon and Brenda Flay, Ian, Kathy and Daniel Parkinson, Debbie Sparks, Ray Menzies, Denis Ebert and Ian Middleton.