With two months to go before the end of the harness racing season, the premierships are starting to take shape.
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On a state level, young-gun reinsmen Tom Ison and Blake Hughes - two regulars to Tamworth harness meetings - are laying down their claims to premiership domination and are looking to reel in more winners before August 30.
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With the majority of their drives being on country tracks, the two youngsters are sitting pretty on the NSW Harness Racing State Concessions Drivers Premiership ladder.
Hughes is heading up the premiership with 84 winning drives and 132 placings from 354 drives, while Ison has 84 winning drives and 130 placings from 346 drives.
With Ison based at the Roy Roots Jnr's stables at Central Mangrove, and Hughes located at Clayton Harmey's stables at Cessnock, they have kept metropolitan reinsman and former Junee resident Cameron Hart at bay in third place. Hart has 83 winners and 224 placings from 607 drives.
Ison and Hughes will be in action this Sunday evening at the Tamworth harness meeting after fulfilling prior driving engagements.
Hughes has six drives at Tamworth and that will follow on the back five drives at Newcastle on Friday night.
Ison has three drives at Newcastle on Friday night before heading back to Menangle on Saturday night in the hope of picking up another winning drive in similar fashion to his win in taking out the feature the Saturday night prior.
Ison drove the Roy Roots Jnr-trained Pitch Perfect to a win in the Multiquip Group 3 Final, with a slick mile rate of 1min 49.8sec after gaining an inside run to the line.
Pitch Perfect had a half-head win over Arma Hotshot (Jack Trainor) and Royal Gamble, with Jack Callaghan in the gig.
Ison will partner Glengarry Rose on Saturday night in the running of the Group 3 Hyland EOFY Sale Frith Stakes for Roy Roots Jnr and The Black Prince in a later race on the program.
The NSW State Concession Drivers Premiership also contains a couple more names that are prevalent at the Tamworth meetings, in Jack Callaghan, who is placed seventh on the premiership with 40 winning drives, and Brad Elder, who is sitting fourth with 47 winning drives.
Jakes Hughes, older brother of Blake, is sitting 10th on the ladder with 25 winning drives.
Meanwhile, Hunter Valley trainer Clayton Harmey is enjoying his best season - notching 100 wins when Kayne Crusader won at Newcastle last Saturday night.
Harmey had a Group 2 winner back in January in taking out the Golden Guitar Final at Tamworth with Wet My Whistle and followed that with a Group One win with Kanye Crusader at Newcastle in taking out the TAB Region Championships.
