Hall Of Fame Inductee Closing In On Magical Milestone
8 June, 2016
Harness
Champion reinsman, Chris Lewis, is fast closing in on a remarkable 5,000 career wins after another outstanding performance in the sulky at Gloucester Park on Tuesday.
The WA Hall Of Fame inductee advanced to 4,897 wins after guiding home short-priced favourites Heez A Masterpiece, Irockmyworld and Importer Exporter.
Lewis continued his excellent form from Friday’s Gloucester Park meeting when he drove four of the ten winners, including three in a row and the main feature.
Lewis claimed his 50th success at Group One level when he sat behind $26 outsider, Lady Luca, a surprising winner of the Diamond Classic Final (1730m).
It was also his 15th Group One win in a two-year-old juvenile feature, that tally includes seven Golden Slippers, three Pearls and three Diamond Classics.
Lewis is out to join a select group with only champion Victorians Gavin Lang and Chris Alford to have driven in excess of 5,000 winners.
His record includes a double at the Hippodrome in Moscow and one win in the United States for his trainer son, Mark Lewis. His first winner arrived courtesy of Classic Heir at Kapunda in South Australia as a 16-year-old.
Lewis’ first success in his adopted home state came at Gloucester Park when he combined with the Ben Geersen-trained, Burgundy in 1976.
He still holds the record as the youngest driver to win an Inter Dominion when, Carclew, defeated, Pure Steel, in the 1976 Championship at Globe Derby in Adelaide.
He won a second Inter Dominion behind Village Kid in the 1986 Brisbane Championship. Bill Horn’s Village Kid provided 88 of Lewis’s remarkable tally.
Julio Santarelli