'We're what you'd call pure hobbyists' - meet the Let's Get Racing team behind prolific winner Violet Love

Up-and-coming breeding and racing syndicate Let's Get Racing is poised for plenty more fun if the redoubtable Violet Love is anything to go by.

The outfit, overseen by Dawn Davis and Maria Bourke, has been brilliantly represented by Amo Racing's two-year-old filly, who has rattled up a trio of victories, most recently at Ripon last week under David Egan. 

Davis and Bourke run the Cleveland-based syndicate alongside their day jobs. They were both at Yorkshire's garden racecourse to cheer on the George Boughey-trained daughter of Havana Grey, who they bred out of the Bated Breath mare Passionate Love.

A delighted Bourke says: "I was a bit over-enthusiastic because she's just a little superpower horse. We got into the winner's enclosure because nobody from Amo Racing was there to support her. 

"I messaged George Boughey's team and they were absolutely fine with it, so we got to see a bit more of her than on the track."

Violet Love, who has finished a close second on her other three runs, was winning her third Great British Bonus, so earning her breeders an extremely handy £60,000. 

On Monday, she stood her ground at the five-day forfeit stage for Saturday's £250,000 Weatherbys Super Sprint at Newbury

The filly is eligible having sold to DH Bloodstock for 16,000gns as a foal from Tattersalls and then to Hamish Macauley and Boughey for £30,000 from Galbertstown Stables at the Goffs UK Premier Yearling Sale the following summer. 

Bourke said: "The GBB payments are brilliant as a breeder because you get a bit of payback for all the early mornings! 

"The filly has got a proper following as Let's Get Racing does a lot for charity; we're a small syndicate but she's got quite the fan club."

Both Bourke and Davis hail from equine backgrounds, although Bourke had more hands-on experience growing up with horses.

She says: "I'm the daughter of a National Hunt jockey; my father was Jimmy Bourke, and when he retired he worked as assistant to several trainers in the 80s. 

"I grew up being thrown on racehorses, while on my mother's side they were breeders of racehorses from Tipperary and Limerick. 

"I'm in my mid-50s now and in my day there weren't the opportunities for women in racing, so I took a different career but always followed racing. It was only back in 2016, when Dawn and I went halves on a mare, that we got involved."

Davis is equally enthusiastic about horses and went racing with her family from an early age. 

Violet Love as a foal

She says: "I come from Doncaster, the home of the St Leger, so my grandma and grandad took me racing from when I was about three or four. I've always been into racing. It's a lovely sport. It can sometimes be frustrating, but it gives a lot when you are winning. 

"We're what you'd call pure hobbyists; we have our own companies and work full time. We get up at five every morning to look after our mares, then start the day job, before returning to the mares in the evening."

The duo set up the club and from the get-go have encouraged anyone and everyone to join, from those with little or no racing background or knowledge to those who already own or have shares in racehorses. 

On how Let's Get Racing came about, Bourke says: "We had a mare we owned 50 per cent in and we wanted to get into ownership. So we set up a small racing club. We wanted it to be inclusive, so anyone could come along and learn. 

"We set some boundaries; the first month's payment gets donated to Yorkshire Racehorse Retraining & Rehoming – much of what we do is about welfare."

The club, which has had winners with Mark Walford and Karl Burke, raises money for several charities, another being the Brain Tumour Society. Personal circumstances relate to that particular cause. 

Bourke explains: "We bred a horse during Covid-19 called Coco – the members' children choose the names and my niece and nephew went for Coco. At the time there was a daughter of an owner, a relative of Dawn, who had a brain tumour, so we started sending videos while she was in Bristol. 

"She spent a year in hospital and I was sending videos of Coco our foal as she turned into a yearling. Unbeknown to us, the ward was called the Starlight Ward and her videos were being passed around to all the children. So when she headed to the racetrack we called her Coco Starlight and ten per cent of any of the prize-money goes to the brain tumour charity."

The buck has passed from the now-retired Coco Starlight to Cookie Queen, or Cookie as she is known. The daughter of Outstrip was fifth on her second start in the race after Violet Love's at Ripon last week and has an entry at Redcar this Sunday on what could be a busy, memorable weekend for Let's Get Racing, which aims to continue raising funds for the Brain Tumour Society.

"We retired Coco as she didn't really like racing, but we've got Cookie, who is with Tony Coyle," says Bourke.

"Let's Get Racing is probably a bit of a quirky racing club, it's a mix of people including some who have never had a share in a racehorse and others who have lots of shares. It's a fun little community."

There is a good bit more to look forward to for the club and its members, via a number of broodmares, young stock and horses in and out of training. They include Cookie Queen's dam Grape Shot, a daughter of Nathaniel and Beverly D Stakes winner Angara, and Passionate Love, dam of Violet Love and Coco Starlight.

Bourke says: "We've currently got two broodmares, one horse in training and two yearlings coming through, including Violet Love's half-brother. 

"We've got another two going through retraining who never made the track. We give them to Yorkshire Racehorse Retraining & Rehoming for three to four months for retraining."

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