Gatton horsewoman searching for maiden victory

By Jordan Gerrans

On the back of a career-best run at Toowoomba on Saturday evening under lights, horsewoman Shari Murdoch and Duchess Bree appear as close as they have ever come to a special milestone.

The long-time Gatton trainer is heavily involved in two codes of the racing industry – preparing her own team of gallopers as well as helping her father Noel with his kennel of greyhounds.

While victories in the dogs have come regularly for the Murdochs, they have been few and far between for Shari with her small thoroughbred stable. 

In fact, since Shari first started a horse in a race in early 2004, she is yet to collect a winner.

That is the same case for the one galloper she conditions, with Duchess Bree yet to score in her 32 career attempts.

It all looked like it was coming together at Clifford Park on Saturday as the nearing seven-year-old mare loomed up in the straight and looked like the winner for a few strides.

“I have gone close and I would love to win one as I have been in the game for a long time,” Shari said on Monday morning.

“I think this mare is handy – she is not a top horse – but she is handy, she is consistent.

“She is a good horse, she just needs to get the right run. Even if she has been unplaced at times, she has not been too bad in her runs.

“She is a real little trier, she tries her heart out every time you ask her.”

The 1200 metre maiden at Toowoomba on Saturday night did not become the breakthrough occasion as Duchess Bree ran into one better, Lindsay Hatch’s Tropic Sands bursting through underneath the Murdoch mare to claim the prize.

The stable have decided to quickly back-up Duchess Bree following the strong run and will face the starter again on Wednesday at Ipswich.

Despite drawing wide for the Bundamba assignment, Shari has booked the services of emerging apprentice hoop Bailey Wheeler.

And, what would the emotions be like if the daughter of Bullet Train was able to nab her first victory?

“I would be so excited,” Shari said.

“I keep trying and it would be nice. I would love to win a town race at Ipswich. I think she has got a chance but she is set to face a harder field in town.

“She does a run a good 1350 metre race at Ipswich.”

Despite the winless run, Shari has stuck with her mare through thick and thin.

The dual-code participant has had other race horses in years gone by but is just working with the one galloper at the moment.

She rides Duchess Bree in her gallops at the Gatton track every morning.

Shari described Duchess Bree as a horse that just thrives on work and needs to keep ticking along.

The trainer has no concerns about the quick back-up from Saturday night at Toowoomba towards the Wednesday race.

“I was very happy with the run but I thought we may have gone a tad early in the straight,” she said of Saturday’s event.

“If we had waited a little longer, we might have been right in the finish. She only really has a 300 metre sprint.

“She is going terrific and the day after her race she was bucking and galloping around her yard.”

The Saturday night run was her second-up performance from a spell and the trainer believes the mare has come back better than ever after the short freshen up. 

As well as her own galloper, Shari is instrumental in her father's kennel of dogs, despite living many hours away from Noel.

Noel lives and prepares his greyhounds at Oakhurst, which is just outside of Maryborough.

The veteran dog man almost exclusively races his dogs on a Sunday night at Albion Park and had half a dozen go around on the most recent occasion.

From her Gatton home, Shari will drive to Oakhurst to help her father and the dogs to make their way to ‘the Creek’.

From their six starters, the Murdochs had two run second on Sunday, which was a pleasing result Shari says.

Speaking in November of 2021 after Cha Cha Charlie made the first ever Listed Queensland Flame Final, Noel declared Shari does plenty of the handling and physical work at the track with the dogs. 

As he is battling to walk at times these days, Shari’s involvement in the kennel is invaluable, the veteran trainer said at the time.