Driver Sam Clotworthy making his mark in Queensland

By Jordan Gerrans

To deliver trainer Stephen Bunz just the second victory of mare Im Isabella’s career – and her first remarkably since late in 2017 – was a significant occasion for driver Sam Clotworthy.

The New Zealand-born driver  has relocated to the Sunshine State after most recently plying his trade in Tasmania, aiming to break into the metropolitan ranks in Queensland and make his mark as a driver.

Bunz is one of the handful of trainers who has heavily supported Clotworthy in his short time in Queensland, so to get Im Isabella up at Redcliffe on Wednesday evening was a special moment.

It has been a lengthy dry spell for the eight-year-old pacer, not winning since September of 2017 – her lone career victory before this week – but she found the right race, and got the right run at The Triangle on Wednesday night over 1780 metres.

It was a five-and-a-half-metre margin in the end that Clotworthy and the mare put on the field, with the ambitious driver admitted it could have been much more if he drove her out hard to the line.

“It was a huge thrill for me, there is nothing better than getting a winner for those smaller trainers like Stephen, he is really loyal to me and has been putting me on his entire team,” Clotworthy said on Thursday morning.

“To get one up for him, it was really good.

“The mare, she has been pretty frustrating, she has been doing things wrong in races or getting too far back and they sprint home.

“She needs everything to go right and on Wednesday night, she had the right draw and everything fell into place – it was a great thrill to get her home.”

The Bunz stable, which has around six in work, have been rewarded for sticking with Im Isabella after she could not add to her first career triumph in almost 50 months.

Fittingly, her other only win came at Redcliffe for driver Leonard Cain and then trainer Russell Kajewski.

She also collected a QBRED bonus for the victory on Wednesday.

In his short time driving in Queensland, Clotworthy has been supported by trainers like Bunz, the leading stable of Grant Dixon – where he works away from his driving – as well as Donny Smith and Mark Rees, among others.

“He is a good bloke, he battles away and works hard,” Clotworthy said of Bunz.

“He turns up, he does not spend a lot of money on them when he buys them and the mare had a $12,000 bonus on Wednesday night.

“He has really supported me over the last few months with a number of drives from his stable.”

Clotworthy has enjoyed an interesting journey within the racing industry, starting off with the harness horses in NZ before making a switch over to the gallops.

He rode track work and worked as a stable foreman for big-name trainers such as Gai Waterhouse and Anthony Cummings, including travelling with some of Cummings’ horses to a recent spring carnival.

While he loved working with the gallopers, Clotworthy was keen to return to the harness game, thriving on the competitive nature of being out on the track as a driver – instead of watching in the grand stand as one of his gallopers went around with no control on the result after doing all the hard work behind the scenes.

He first went to work for trainer Jack Butler in Queensland before eventually moving over to the powerful Dixon barn for more opportunities.

“I won the BOTRA series in Tassie and the racing down there is limited, there is only one or two meetings a week,” he said.

“I wanted to try and make it as a driver, give it a real go and you probably do not quite get the opportunities in Tasmania.

“Coming in from the outside into the racing industry here, it can be hard at first but I have been getting 10-15 drives a week for different trainers.

“I am getting my name out there and I now have my metro licence with the five-point claim on Saturday nights, which is big for me.”