Norton trainer Ollie Pears’ Rebel with a cause (From Gazette & Herald)

Norton trainer Ollie Pears’ Rebel with a cause

10:01am Friday 5th February 2010 in

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THE racing calendars scattered around Ollie Pears’ place are not there for decoration. The Norton trainer knows their contents inside and out.

We’re talking about Rebel Duke, the horse which won the shrewd handler the biggest race of his saddling career to date when nailing a Class 2 handicap at Southwell on January 1.

Banking a shade over £10,000 in prize money, what a New Year that was.

Now Pears is masterminding the six-year-old’s next foray on the track, and he can recite the Weatherbys-produced racing schedule like some people can regurgitate dictionaries.

It’s impressive to watch.

“He will be on soft ground, and very, very flat tracks,” he said. “No bends, because he can’t turn, so I can’t take him to Chester. I will be looking at what races are available. I know there’s a five-furlong race on about April 8 – a five-furlong conditions race at Nottingham. That would be a brilliant track for him.

“If it was soft, like it has been at that meeting before, and a horse rated in the mid-90s has won that race before, that would be a possibility. Then there’s a good sprint at York in May. It could be soft, couldn’t it?”

It’s this kind of detailed knowledge that is getting Pears noticed. He has developed a canny reputation for being able to mould a horse to get a win, to find the right race, against the right opposition and raid the prize money.

Following 14 Flat wins in his first full year in 2008, 19 went into the winner’s enclosure in 2009. Prize money just about doubled, and two winners are already on the board in 2010.

Wheeling and dealing is Pears’ priority. Buy a horse, get it to win and move it on. Sometimes they are claimed, sometimes they are sold, but it isn’t usually very long before there is a fresh equine face at his Highfield base.

Rebel Duke was different because he broke the mould. That Class 2 winner proved Pears wasn’t just adept at finding the key to a well-worn thoroughbred.

It proved that, with the right ammunition, he can fire missiles at the big prizes. And that’s his long term aim.

“Wheeling and dealing is the way forward for now,” he added. “I would love, one day, to get out of training claiming horses but we are gradually getting there – and if that’s what they need to be to win then I will run them there.

“Last season went brilliantly – our second full year. We had 19 winners in total, because we had one Chase winner as well. Prize money went up. We had 27 seconds, which is kind of frustrating.

“If half a dozen of those had won we would have been on 25 winners.

“Now we have got to progress again this year.

“The highlight of last year was probably having our first double and, going right back to January last year, we had a decent gamble on a horse called Herbert Crescent. It was good to pull that off because that was his day.

“The biggest race we won was My Arch winning over fences at Musselburgh.

“We keep buying a few horses and we keep selling. Horses are getting claimed.”

One of those horses recently recruited to Pears’ yard is Ishetoo, on whom the late Jamie Kyne won the biggest success of his tragically cut short career when winning at York last May.

Rated 93, Ishetoo is symbolic of the improvements Pears is endeavouring to make to the quality of horses in his yard.

“He may end up in that York race again,” he added. “He’s a talented horse and appears to go on any ground over five or six furlongs. He has come with the owner’s intention to run him in the Lincoln Handicap at Doncaster in March.

“He’s a nice horse to pick up. He’s a big, high profile horse coming from one small trainer (Alan Dickman) to another small trainer. If he wasn’t coming to me, he would be going somewhere else so you take them don’t you?

“One of those big Heritage Handicaps will hopefully be right up his street. It might be a Great St Wilfrid, he might up at Ayr. There would be stacks of options for him. He has a lot of ability and he will switch off.

“He’s a very different horse to Rebel Duke, who is a typical sprinter. It’s like riding a little rubber ball whereas Ishetoo covers a lot of ground and you wouldn’t think you are on a sprinter.”

And looking ahead to the rest of this year?

Pears continued: “I want to train more winners than last year and if I could top more than £100,000 in prize money that would be good. I would like to win a nice race and I have got two or three who are capable.

“We can always get one or two more boxes up at the yard though. There’s always scope."