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So when the local trainer picked up two first-place finishes from the two runners he entered in the Tamworth meet on Tuesday, he considered it "a bonus."

Six-year-old gelding, Zoffany's Gaze, and five-year-old mare, Strelitzia, both edged out razor-thin wins in races five and six respectively.

It was the former's third victory in five starts, to go with two second-place finishes.

"I really think [Zoffany's Gaze] is worth a crack at a highway race in Sydney," Mason said.

"You don't see too many with a record like his."

Tuesday's race was, however, very nearly the third runner-up finish on Zoffany's Gaze's record.

After smoking a path down the final straight in Tamworth, he finished just five hundredths of a length ahead of Small Town, trained by Sue Grills.

The last seconds of the race were nerve-wracking for Mason, but he had a gut feeling his charge had the edge.

"When you watched it, it did look as though he won. It usually does favour the outside horse here in photo finishes," he said.

"Even though it was a photo, I did think he won."

Strelitzia's victory in race six was her second consecutive such result, after another win in Tamworth on May 31.

Mason's horses were helped, the trainer suspects, by a track that was slightly better than its soft seven rating.

"I think it was pretty good," he said.

"I didn't get to see what sort of times they ran, but it was nowhere near heavy. On the old scale it was probably slow."

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