When James Ponsonby arrives at Towac Park on a cold winter's morning, it won't be a foreign temperature for the successful horse trainer.
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In 2007 - back when Ponsonby was part of the Harness Racing industry - a seven-week stint in Canada came his way, with a need to re-invigorate his passion for racing.
It was an experience he won't forget in a hurry.
"It was in winter driving trotters so I was really lucky there and the snow was thick. It was cold but I don't imagine it'll get any worse than that here," he laughed.
Now, 14 years since that overseas adventure, Ponsonby finds himself in Orange after a long stint training thoroughbreds at The Oaks, Camden.
'They're pretty much the reason we do the sport'
The decision to move was finalised three weeks ago, with the trainer holding 20 boxes at Towac Park.
It was a change based on family and the opportunities that come with racing in the country.
"Our lease ran out at The Oaks and we had been speaking to (Racing Orange general manager) Bree McMinn since the beginning of January in regards to moving up here and it just worked out to be a good time for the horses in terms of moving on," he said.
"The only downfall is not having Keryn and the kids here at the moment, that's been pretty hard for me, because they're pretty much the reason we do the sport."
While his wife Keryn and children Henry, Sebastian, Victoria and Lucy have yet to fully move to Orange yet, they haven't shy'd away from becoming involved in racing at Orange when they can come to town.
Henry, the oldest of the children, is known to sport a Racing Orange shirt and was part of the preparation efforts for Towac's Ladies Day on February 11.
"Moving up here will hopefully be a good experience for the kids to get out in the country," Ponsonby said.
"That's really it in a nut shell, hopefully it all works. We still know where the city races are and hopefully as the season progresses we get a few of our better horses back there for TAB Highways.
"It (Towac) gives us a great backdrop to train them off here, it's a great environment with all the facilities you need.
"It's no different to training at Warwick Farm when I was working for Mark Newnham, we've been able to fall back in to that pattern of training. When at the farm at The Oaks it was a different style to how we trained compared to a normal training at a track but here we've been able to fall back into a normal pattern.
"Hopefully we see a gradual improvement in our horses and get those better results again."
Experience in racing
That winning form shouldn't take long to return for Ponsonby who has had a long history in the racing industry.
By the age of 16 he was training and driving trotters, with his wife Keryn there from the start to now.
A move to thoroughbred racing came when Ponsonby had an opportunity to work with Newnham, a successful former jockey turned trainer.
"We knew him socially before I went to work for him, Mark gave me a great opportunity to learn how to train thoroughbreds," he said.
"Whilst they're both horses, the two breeds are substantially different in how you do your training and what you do with them and Mark was able to give me a great guide. We've been given a lot of good opportunities in the past and a lot of my owners have been very supportive of the move to a country area and we hope that in time we can repay them with winners."
The majority of those connections for Ponsonby are based in Sydney which include James Whitfield, John Stanley, Andrew Martin and the Gibb family.
TAB Highway opportunities
With the trainer now moving to the country, his focus will remain on TAB Highways and the allusive Country Championship.
Ponsonby has previously had five-year-old gelding Phillipsburg race in the Southern Country Championships heat, with fifth placed finishes while his other five-year-old Socrates previously won a Highway event at Royal Randwick in October.
"We've got some new horses for this season that hopefully we'll be able to target in the Country Championships," he said.
"There's so much more opportunity with TAB Highways ... for the ownership group unless you've got a genuine Saturday horse there's no other way to make that sort of prize money (unless you're in Highways) ... you can turn a good year into a great year just off having a good highway horse.
"We've got a horse there at the moment called Statesville that'll hopefully run in this heat of the country championships, if he doesn't hopefully we can just run in the Highways.
"I think what people don't really see yet, but they'll see in the next twelve to eighteen months, is that a lot of these horses that run in highways are genuine city class horses."
A change of pace
Along with the potential prize money on offer in the country, Ponsonby added the passion of the Racing Orange committee convinced him that a change was necessary.
"Whilst living on the coast is great, the financial benefits aren't always there. We've found we've been very lucky with the country system and hence the move to Orange," he said.
"It's a really nice environment, the temperature will be a little up and down but we were looking for somewhere that's still passionate about racing and we think this is the town that still has that passion.
"Bree certainly does have that passion and you need that re-invigoration of people that are keen to get that racing into the general public and beyond.
"They're the real key aspects of our business to how we grow it and hopefully having people like Bree allows us to do that."
Racing will return to Towac Park on February 27 with Cowra Jockey Club's meeting transferred to Orange.
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