Harness boilover as Call Me Hector breaks Mowbray track record

Driven by his Oatlands owner-trainer Matthew Cooper, he led all the way for his 19^th career win in the Impress Print Free-For-All.

Left in his wake was hot favourite and $442,000-earner Ignatius who got bailed up on the pegs and couldn't get clear until the race was over.

But, even if he had got a run earlier, it would have taken a Herculean effort to catch Call Me Hector who carved out sectionals of 29.56, 29.22, 28.02 and 27.35 on his way to a track record mile-rate of 1:54.34.

The time eclipsed the previous record of 1:54.5 set by Mister Lennox in May 2017.

Call Me Hector ran a marginally faster 1:54.3 when he set a state record in Hobart 12 months ago.

Since then he's claimed some big scalps, not the least being the state's free-for-all king Ryley Major at Mowbray in July.

Call Me Hector is a half brother to Cooper's former top mare Call Her Julie and it's that connection that led to the gelding being sent to Tasmania 17 months ago.

Cooper said Call Me Hector's former trainer David Jack had called him out of the blue to see if he was interested in taking the horse.

Jack had also trained Call Her Julie earlier in her career and had been impressed with how the mare had progressed under Cooper's care.

"I had been following Call Me Hector because of his breeding and I thought his form hadn't been too bad so when David rang I jumped at the chance (to take him)," Cooper said.

Call Me Hector has now won 11 races for the trainer, including one at Melton in January.

Reinsman Conor Crook continued on his winning way in the first three races on Bridwood Bella (trained by Rohan Hadley), Lake Eyre (Ben Yole)) and Pockets Of Courage (Steve Lukac).

Two-year-old filly Bridwood Bella, who led all the way to win in a record 1:57.4 at her debut in June, almost matched that time from a second-row draw, going 1:57.7.

Crook pushed through early to settle in the death and went to the lead at the 500m.