![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Nathan-and-mark-Purdon-celebrate-oscar-Bs-win-blog-Sept-2025-v2__ResizedImageWzYwMCwzNDdd.jpg\")
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By Michael Guerin<\/p>\n
The two Metro Finals at Alexandra Park tonight will give punters a glimpse into Nathan Purdon\u2019s future.<\/p>\n
The talented young trainer and his father Mark will end their training partnership at the end of the month, which doubles at the finish of the 2025 harness racing season, with Mark taking a step back from fulltime training.<\/p>\n
That had been his plan two years ago when he moved north to live in Matamata but the champion trainer has stayed training with Nathan to help him set up his business.<\/p>\n
But Mark\u2019s recent trip to Canterbury for a hectic spring reminded him that fulltime training of a large team is no longer his main focus in life so he will step down from the partnership and train a handful of horses mainly based in Morrinsville, headed by Akuta and Oscar Bonavena.<\/p>\n
Nathan will continue to train at his new Pukekohe base, from where he prepares Look To Da Stars and Arden\u2019s Memory, the two favourites for their respective $35,000 Metro Finals tonight.<\/p>\n
\u201cDad was finding the tie to the day to day running of the stable and the travelling needed to work the Auckland horses and keep in close touch a bit harder than he had expected,\u201d says Nathan.<\/p>\n
\u201cIdeally I would have appreciated another season perhaps but he will still be playing a major role in our setup.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHis advice and assistance will be valuable for us even if his name isn\u2019t on the licence and he is keen to continue race driving.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe will also be helping us select the yearlings so his involvement will still be valuable for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe intends to cut back on his commitments to that level and it is understandable in the circumstances.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will have around 20 horses in work here, with capacity of around 25 and plenty of really nice young horses.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the father and son will still officially be in partnership until January 1, Nathan trains Look To Da Stars (R1, No.8) at Pukekohe and he has looked back to his best with two huge wins in recent weeks.<\/p>\n
He has always looked an open class trotter in the making and if he behaves himself tonight he should be able to work forward in the middle stages and dominate his opponents, with Father Barry the obvious danger.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe think if he stays trotting like he has been he could be an open class trotter next year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arden\u2019s Memory (R4, No 4) faces a bigger challenge the pacing final tonight but was able to sit parked for the last 1100m of her heat so is the one to beat in a race that could be decided by the pressure inside the first lap.<\/p>\n
Tonight\u2019s meeting also hosts two good fillies and mares races, one for trotters and the other for pacers, as natural lead-ups to next Friday\u2019s two Group 1s, the Queen Of Hearts and Queen of Diamonds.<\/p>\n
Both have three-year-old filly favourites with Ya Rite Darl needing to regain her manners and beat some smart older mares in the trot but Arafura is the last-start winner of the NZ Oaks and should be too good in the Caduceus Club Northern Breeders Stakes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"5 December 2025 , Punters Info By Michael Guerin The two Metro Finals at Alexandra Park tonight will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58095,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[111,139,69,213],"class_list":{"0":"post-168600","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-new-zealand","9":"tag-newzealand","10":"tag-nz","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=168600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=168600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=168600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=168600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}