Heavyweight Hero claims NZ Trotting Free-For-All

Muscle Mass notched up his second Group 1 winner in the space of ten days when the Bob Butt trained and driven Heavyweight Hero proved too good for his rivals in the NZ Trotting Free-For-All at Addington Raceway on Cup Day.

A deserved winner after a string of feature race second placings in the past few months, Heavyweight Hero landed three-back on the markers in the running before charging home strongly up the passing lane when Cracker Hill angled out rounding the home turn to score by three-quarters of a length.

Heavyweight Hero’s winning time of 2:23.9 was a new national record for 1980m, with it slicing almost a second off Tough Monarch’s record set in the same race the previous year.

It was the second all age NZ record for Heavyweight Hero, with the big striding 7-year-old also the current 2600m mobile start record holder.

Heavyweight Hero has now won 10 races and banked just over $200,000 in stakes earnings.

Bred by Canterbury’s Gael Murray, Heavyweight Hero is out of the unraced Sundon mare Successor, a full sister to the 2009 NZ Trotting Free-For-All place-getter Running On Time.

Muscle Mass (pictured) is enjoying a terrific month of results on both sides of the Tasman with the stallion also siring the first two runners home, Mexicana and Illawong Barmah, in the Group 1 Redwood Classic at Maryborough at the beginning of November.