It's oh so different on the opposite side of the planet. As Victoria is suffering from a record-breaking heat wave that triggered last weekend's killer bushfires, former South Australian trainer Jeremy Gask, now training in England, has been unable to work his horses for a week due to a cold snap.

Gask's Wiltshire property, in England's south-west, has been under a deep blanket of snow that has closed his private training tracks. It has taken Gask's staff most of each morning to clear the snow so the horses can be taken for exercise on the walkers.

Thankfully, Gask imported a high-speed treadmill which has helped him retain some fitness levels in his team of horses which includes five Australian horses that will have come no closer to snow in their homeland than a few ice-packs on sore shins. Three of the Australians have raced and performed encouragingly. Former South Australian mare Mrs Penny (by Planchet) has won at Wolverhampton at her second outing, while Catalan Bay (by Rock Of Gibraltar) and Horseshoe Reef (by Encosta De Lago) placed second at their only outings at Lingfield late in January. Two others Denton (by Montjeu) and One Way Or Another (by Carnegie) are in full work.

Gask and his assistant trainer Paul Cooper, who formerly worked at Lindsay Park, have found the weather just one of the many conditions they have had to adapt to since Gask began training for the Horses First Racing group early in 2008.