JASON COYLE’S LONG TERM PLAN PAYS OFF IN THE BIRTHDAY CARD

Catch The Glory was strong on the line in defeating Inkaruna in Saturday's Birthday Card Stakes - courtesy Bradley Photographers.

With due respect to the McDonald mania and Waller wizardry that made the Slipper meeting so special, perhaps a handful of other fine achievements didn’t get the accolades they deserved. One of them was undoubtedly the training performance of Jason Coyle to win the Gr 3 Birthday Card Stakes with Catch The Glory. The Warwick Farm trainer has long enjoyed a reputation as a gifted trainer of fillies and mares. He’s also a thinking trainer with an innate understanding of every horse in his care.

Last September he was contemplating a spell for Catch The Glory following the mare’s fifth run of her spring campaign. At the fourth of those outings she’d comfortably beaten Polyglot and Cosmanova in a Rosehill BM78. In the fifth she finished a cracking second to Fire Star with talented Kerguelen third in a very strong BM88 on the same track.

This was where Coyle’s astute judgement came into play. He made the call to put her in the paddock for a two week sabbatical before plotting a path to the Gr 3 Warra on Gong day at Kembla, still about nine weeks away. Catch The Glory finished second in two Warwick Farm barrier trials, one at the end of October and the other in mid November. She went into a strong Warra “super fresh” on November 22nd with Jason Collett on board and charged home from the one out one back spot to beat The Black Cloud and Sunrise. Jason Coyle’s plan had worked perfectly and the attractive mare had grabbed her first sample of black type. Into the paddock she went.

Catch The Glory (Jason Collett) grabbed The Black Cloud in the last few strides to win The Warra at Kembla Grange November 2025 - courtesy Bradley Photographers.

The experiment had given Jason the perfect template for Catch The Glory’s current preparation. He brought her up very gradually to her first trial at Warwick Farm on March 2nd in which she simply cantered around with the pack. She was allowed to do a lot more in her second trial at Rosehill finishing second to the $12 million earner Overpass beaten under a length. Interestingly the trainer also nominated the mare for Saturday’s Gr 1 Galaxy in which she was declared first emergency. It became a “no-brainer” when Catch The Glory drew the extreme outside in the Gr 1, and the coveted inside gate in the Gr 3.

It can be said that Adam Hyeronimus’ ride on the flashy mare lost nothing against any of James McDonald’s performances on the day. “Hippo” simply let Catch the Glory leave the gates under her own steam and had her in a great rhythm midfield as they joined the course proper. He started to angle away from the fence at the 600m and was parked right on the heels of heavily supported favourite Inkaruna as they straightened for home. Catch The Glory and Inkaruna made their runs together in pursuit of leader Spring Lee who was giving plenty of cheek at the 150m. Catch The Glory used her giant stride to full effect as she got the upper hand close to home to win her second Gr 3, adding significantly to her future stud value. It’s not hard to tell Jason Coyle thinks the world of this mare.

Catch The Glory (Adam Hyeronimus) was airborne on the line in the Birthday Card Stakes. She nailed Inkaruna with Spring Lee in 3rd place - courtesy Bradley Photographers.

“She’s such a pleasure to train in every way,” he said. “She never leaves an oat, works whatever you want her to work and has developed into such a professional racehorse. She’s genuine in everything she does and what about that massive action. She covers a huge amount of ground and has the style to go with it. She’s now won two Gr 3’s and deserves to go up a peg. We’ll target the Gr 2 Sapphire Stakes on April 11th over 1200m and go from there. I honestly feel we haven’t reached the bottom of her yet. I’m already thinking about a freshen after the Sapphire and perhaps a trip to Brisbane in May/June for some better fillies and mare’s races. It’s all ahead of her.”

Saturday’s win takes the mare’s record to an impressive 6 wins and 4 placings from just 15 race starts for a very tidy $626,025 in prize money - a figure that eclipses her purchase price at the 2023 Magic Millions National Sale. “I liked her from the moment I inspected her,” said the trainer. “Her sire Zousain was starting to get a few wraps and I knew he’d been a good horse himself with second placings in three Gr 1’s. “Her dam Catch That Cat is by Tale Of The Cat and had won six in Victoria including three at Moonee Valley. She was passed in to begin with, but I later negotiated with her owner/breeder Brett Kirkby who agreed to let me have her for $50,000.

Slipper day is all over for another year. Catch The Glory returns through the golden horse shoe after a win in the final race of the day - courtesy Bradley Photographers.

“On returning to Sydney I set about syndicating her and quickly had nine owners including myself. Most of the spots were filled by existing clients and I was delighted when the vendor Brett Kirkby decided to come on board. By golly we’ve had some fun. She was a little bit “hot” early in the piece but quickly settled down and is now a pleasure to train. She won her maiden at Kembla in August 2024, followed by a BM72 at Warwick Farm, a BM72 Midway at Randwick and a BM78 at Rosehill. Then came her Gr 3 double, The Warra and Saturday’s Birthday Card Stakes. She’s just another example of horses at the lower end of the yearling sale market that can do the job.”

Jason was all smiles after a Rosehill win with More Energy in 2018 - courtesy Bradley Photographers.

Despite a massive setback early in his career when Nathan Tinkler’s Patinack Farm racing and breeding enterprise collapsed, Jason Coyle has come back to establish a reputation as one of Sydney’s most reliable and astute trainers. At the time of the much publicised insolvency Jason plummeted from 80 horses in work to a mere half dozen. With horse accommodation no longer available to him at Warwick Farm he leased six boxes from fellow trainer Steve Englebrecht and got on with the business of picking himself up and starting all over again. To this day he marvels at the good fortune to come his way.

A succession of horses came under his care each destined to win multiple races - Berry Delicious (5 metro wins), Scream Machine (6 metro wins and a Wagga Cup), Insensata (6 wins including Rosehill and Eagle Farm), Salsonic (4 wins including Gr 2 Queensland Guineas), the lightly raced Va Pensiero (3 wins including Gr 3 San Domenico and Gr 3 Run To The Rose), Siren’s Fury 6 wins including Gr 3 Dark Jewel Classic and Gr 3 Star Kingdom Stakes), Memes (6 wins including four at Randwick), Slightly Sweet (5 wins including the listed Winter Stakes, Gr 3 Keith Nolan Classic and Gr 3 James Carr Stakes), and White Moss (8 wins including the Gr 3 Nivison, the Gr 2 Millie Fox and two editions of the Gr 2 Sapphire Stakes. These were the special horses to bring Jason Coyle back from the brink of obscurity, and the horses to showcase his talents.

Siren's Fury was one of the horses to regenerate Jason's training career. Here she is defeating Manuel in the 2019 Gr. 3 Star Kingdom Stakes with Tim Clark in the saddle - courtesy Bradley Photographers.

Goodness knows how impressive Coyle’s record would stack up had the Patinack disaster not so brutally impeded his progress. With rarely more than 25 horses in work Jason has won 554 races including two Gr 1’s while under the Patinack banner. Add to that 6 Gr 2’s, 9 Gr 3’s, and 9 at listed level and you’ve got a pretty impressive CV. If nothing else the Patinack experience has taught him never to put all his eggs in one basket. From this point on Jason Coyle’s door is open to all those owners who prefer to be a part of a smaller training operation - a commercial stable where the trainer is across all issues no matter how minor. Jason Coyle knows his stuff and is a very pleasant bloke to boot.