Ballarat Cup: Darren Weir’s instincts paid off with Profit Share

Find a nice filly for up to $100,000.

Needless to say, Jones and his prospective co-owners were surprised to receive a call from Weir that night saying he had found the horse they were after, but with a few small quirks.

“When Darren said he had bought us a colt for $22,000, I nearly fell on my chair,” Jones said. “We’d asked for a filly for much more than that, but when Darren said he thought it was a nice horse, well, we decided to trust his judgment.”

It was a telling moment for the owners as that colt – better known as Profit Share – quickly repaid the faith shown in his trainer’s judgment, taking just two starts to recoup his paltry purchase price.

The gelded son of Domesday will be out to further reward his ecstatic group of owners at Saturday’s Ballarat Cup meeting when he takes his place in the $100,000 Thomas Jewellers VOBIS Gold Eureka Stockade, 1400m.

Jones, who has owned horses with Weir since the Berriwillock horseman first gained his owner-trainer licence in 1995, said Weir’s relaxed nature was pivotal to Profit Share’s development, as he himself had been ‘a touch coltish’ in his maiden campaign.

“The thing with Darren is he’s just a knockabout bloke; honest as the day is long,” Jones said. “Whatever he does, he gives you 100 per cent and he never leads you astray. 

“Once he says a horse has got a bit of potential you just keep going with it because you know it’s the truth, that’s just how he operates.”

Jones is hoping Profit Share can emulate the deeds of another ‘Weir bargain buy’, two-time group 1-winner Trust In A Gust, which kicked off a remarkable campaign with an emphatic victory in last year’s Eureka Stockade. 

Weir has already begun to plot a similar path through the VOBIS Gold Premier Race series for Profit Share, who incidentally is set to carry the same saddlecloth as Trust In A Gust in Saturday’s race.

Should he salute, the highly-rated youngster will take home an enviable $90,000 worth of prizemoney for his owners, thanks largely to the $30,000 worth of Super VOBIS and VOBIS Gold bonuses on offer to the victor.

And as for Saturday’s Cup Day mission? Jones remained quietly confident.

“I’d be hopeful of him running first three, if everything falls his way you think that’d be where he’d finish,” he said.

“He’s only been out of the top two (placings) once in his life and that was when he over-raced behind a pretty smart one at Flemington.

“He’s settling much better now and we know that he’ll go out there and try his guts out. 

“He’ll give a good sight and we’ll be cheering him on, that’s for sure.”