Our Industry – Adriana McAuliffe
Adriana McAuliffe after her win with Apologize. Photo Credit: Photography by Jodie Hallows.
With just the one horse currently in work, Adriana Mcauliffe has been involved in horses all her life, with the early part of her racing career enthralled in the gallopers. McAuliffe made her training debut in thoroughbred racing in WA in her younger years, hanging up the bridle for good in 2005 before making the permanent switch in codes.
Her stint in Thoroughbreds wasn’t without reward, with her runner Lady Remon winning three races.
“It was just becoming too hard to do the gallopers. It was hard to get jockeys to do fast work, so it all just got too hard.”
Making the change to harness racing in the late 1990’s as a reinswoman, McAuliffe took the reins in 1996, and in her two seasons of driving, drove in a total of 12 races, but unfortunately didn’t manage to score a win in the sulky. It wasn’t until 2010/2011 that she gained her trainers licence on her own, and during that season McAuliffe had her first win with Northern Mystery, winning on the 4th of January in 2011 at Northam.
Taking a break between 2012 and 2019, McAuliffe has had just the 19 starters since returning to training, but the success really began when she purchased Apologize from South Australia for just $4500, who won first up for his new stable earlier in the year and has gone on to have 14 starts this season for 2 wins and taken his earnings in WA to $16,551 and has only failed to salute the judge once in that time, due to heat stress.
“He’s been unlucky along the way, but he’s almost always been in the first four, I was very fortunate to get him.”
“I wasn’t really looking for another horse, I had one in work that I couldn’t get going and I was really devastated about, and my brother said he saw this horse on harness trading and I knew I should get something else, and they convinced me to give it a go,”
“I was just getting out of it for a while, with a bit of bad luck and what not, I got a little but disillusioned.”
The four-year-old stallion has done a big job for his new connections, with McAuliffe sending him out for a break after his last start win at Northam.
“I’m hoping he will make it to city class, but you never know. I’m giving him a break now so I’m hoping he will mature and fill out a bit and hopefully he will come back bigger and better,”
“He’s got the most beautiful nature, he’s just a really lovely horse.”
With Adriana officially retired from her job in the legal industry, she enjoys her time with her horses but isn’t planning on expanding her team anytime soon, explaining that the horses make her life worth living. She currently has just the two horses on her Parkerville property, with retired Pardon My Speed living his life out as a fulltime lawnmower.
Ashleigh Paikos