45 starts, 5 wins, $45,127 stake money to date
Racing Name and Breeding: "O'Sheas" 2000 10 Br g Il Vicolo-Sure Lobell
Stable
Name:
"Rusty"
Owner(s): R J Fantham, D S Rogers, Mrs C Rogers, Mrs J M Nickel, Mrs J C Evison,
B E Evison
Breeder(s): I W W Craw, Mrs J L D Craw
With kind permission of Barry Lichter, Racing Journalist with the Sunday Star Times, this was in the paper on Sunday 26 December 2010.
Tears Flow as Rusty beats huge odds
By Barry Lichter
When Nicky Chilcott came back to scale bawling her eyes out, she knew people were staring at her wondering what was wrong.
But even for this tough cookie from Cambridge, the emotion of the moment was overwhelming.
“It might only have been a scummy one-win trot on the grass at Whanganui, in the pouring rain, but it’s something I’ll never forget,” says Chilcott, who trained and drove O’Sheas to win in his first start for 11 months.
For this was a win which really should never have happened.
And when Chilcott thought about all she and the 10-year-old had been through in 2010, it was hardly surprising she choked up.
O’Sheas, or “Rusty” as he’s affectionately known, should really have died at the start of the year.
The survival rate of horses struck down by a twisted bowel isn’t high – the number who make it back to the winner’s stall is minuscule.
Vets put the horse’s survival squarely down to Chilcott’s prompt action after he started showing signs of colic at the Cambridge swimming pool, right next door to the new equine clinic.
Luckily, vets quickly diagnosed he had a full blown twisted bowel and operated on him within hours, almost certainly saving his life by unravelling his intestine before any of it died from blood starvation.
At the time, Chilcott and Rusty’s half-dozen owners were just glad he made it. While he was never going to be a Rowe cup candidate – by Il Vicolo he’s not even bred to trot – he’d still won them three races since they bought him cheaply from the South Island.
And, besides, as Chilcott puts it: “he’s the neatest horse, an absolute darling. You could take him home and he’d flop on the couch and sit and watch TV with you.
“At the stables he’ll walk round with little kids. You wouldn’t get a nicer horse.”
Knowing how few horses ever make it back from twisted bowel episodes, Chilcott and her owners considered retiring Rusty.
But when it was decided to give him another go, they put him out on to the hills for six months to allow his system to recover.
When Rusty came back into work, however, Chilcott soon discovered he couldn’t breathe properly any more, a problem which was blamed on a vein in his neck which had collapsed under the strain of all the medication which helped save his life.
“He was awful to start with, a sad, sad horse. He didn’t want to be there and even this preparation he’s been pulling up roaring:”
Chilcott admits she was beginning to think they were on a hiding to nothing when he went so poorly in a couple of workouts, it almost got to the stage of “do we give him a chance at Whanganui, or retire him.”
But Chilcott upped his workload – “he’s always been a fatty and looks like he’s ready to drop twins” – and then dug into her bag of tricks.
On went a nasal strip, designed to hold open the airway, plus some wind aid, a glycerine and peppermint concoction to lubricate the throat.
Then she tried a “no choke,” a small barrel-like device which oldtimers once favoured, which is strapped under the horse’s throat to stop it from pulling too hard and choking down.
“That was the last resort – I’d tried every other piece of gear in the shed. I don’t know why that would work but it did and in his last workout he never made a noise and felt a lot better.”
While Rusty earned his chance at Whanganui, Chilcott never dreamed he would win. Even now, planning Rusty’s next move, she’s not expecting too much.
“He’s definitely not as good as he was but he’ll do the grass tracks and we’ll just hope he holds up.”
Knowing Rusty, he might just have another surprise in store before he’s finished.
