{"id":140302,"date":"2025-09-16T03:35:12","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T03:35:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/140302\/"},"modified":"2025-09-16T03:35:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T03:35:12","slug":"better-eclipse-leaves-victoria-for-wa-in-career-twist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/140302\/","title":{"rendered":"Better Eclipse leaves Victoria for WA in career twist"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"\"Millionaire Victorian pacer Better Eclipse has moved to Western Australia for the twilight of his stellar career.<\/p>\n

The seven-year-old, who boasts three Group 1 victories amongst his 24 wins and almost $1.4 million, has joined the powerhouse Gary Hall Sr stable with a view to the $450,000 Group 1 WA Pacing Cup at Gloucester Park on December 12.<\/p>\n

It ends a long and hugely successful stint with Jess Tubbs and the late Greg Sugars, where Better Eclipse was transformed from a virtual unknown into one of the best pacers in Australasia.<\/p>\n

Along with his Australian Group 1 wins in the Chariots Of Fire and Sunshine Sprint, Better Eclipse also scored at Group 1 level in last year\u2019s Auckland Cup.<\/p>\n

Notably, Better Eclipse also finished second to the great Leap To Fame in the 2023 Brisbane Inter Dominion final.<\/p>\n

His transformation and surge to the top was one of harness racing\u2019s great stories.<\/p>\n

Better Eclipse hasn\u2019t raced since finishing second in a free-for-all at Melton on August 9.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the horse. I\u2019m just glad he\u2019s gone to a good stable who will look after him well,\u201d Tubbs said.<\/p>\n

Better Eclipse further bolsters Hall Sr\u2019s WA Pacing Cup stocks, headed by his emerging superstar Mister Smartee, winner of the huge Nullarbor\/Fremantle Cup double earlier this year.<\/p>\n

The lightly raced and promising Tubbs-trained Chasing Rex, a winner of five of his 20 starts, is owned in the same interests as Better Eclipse and has also joined Hall Sr\u2019s stable.<\/p>\n

\"\"In other Tubbs stable news, TAB Eureka runner Fighter Command\u2019s immediate racing plans are on hold after his below par run at Menangle last Saturday week.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe just wasn\u2019t himself at all on the night,\u201d Tubbs said. \u201cWhether it was the occasion, the crowd, I\u2019m not sure, but he was off his tree and only got to do one warm up lap.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the race itself, he never really paced right.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve paused everything and it\u2019s all about the horse\u2019s welfare now.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m getting a bone scan on him this week so see if there\u2019s something we don\u2019t know about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite those developments, Tubbs was still on a high after winning two of the feature Nutrien Trotting finals with Tracy The Jet and Howdy Mate at Melton last Saturday night.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo bounce back after the disappointment of the Eureka and have a night like that was terrific,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWinning big races for great people like we did last weekend is what it\u2019s all about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Howdy Mate is part-owned by top US trainer Nancy Takter and Australasia\u2019s leading harness racing presenter, the now NZ-based Brittany Graham.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was a heck of a thrill, especially sharing it with Jess and Nancy,\u201d Graham said.<\/p>\n

Three-year-old filly Tracy The Jet has won five of 10 starts for passionate owner Dom Martello.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat one was really special. Dom\u2019s been one of our biggest supporters since Greg (Sugars) died and it means a lot to help him win a big one like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

PHOTOS:\u00a0<\/p>\n

Better Eclipse \u2013 Dan Costello<\/p>\n

Fighter Command \u2013 Eliza Howlett<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Millionaire Victorian pacer Better Eclipse has moved to Western Australia for the twilight of his stellar career. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":140303,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[3004,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-140302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-racing","tag-racing","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140302"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140302\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/140303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}