The battle for top driver continues into Thursday’s program at Red Shores Racetrack and Casino at the Charlottetown Driving Park.
The capital oval has a 13-dash card slated for a 7 p.m. start Thursday evening.
Jason Hughes continues to lead the driver’s colony in Charlottetown with 76 victories while Marc Campbell sits in second-place with 75 wins. That one win margin could disappear at any moment as Campbell has 10 drives on the program while Hughes is programmed to sit behind seven starters. Gilles Barrieau sits third in the Charlottetown driver’s standings as North America’s second-leading percentage driver has 64 wins in 2015 from just shy of 200 starts at Red Shores Charlottetown while Hughes has over 400 drives this year in Charlottetown.
One of Barrieau’s drives is in the Thursday night feature with post four starter Outside The Wire in the $2,100 event. Perfect Escape is the favourite with the outside post six in the field of half-a-dozen with Campbell in the bike for trainer Jackie Matheson and owners Jack Keenan of Stratford, P.E.I. and Ontario's Joseph Dahl. Other entries include Oh To Be Me (Gary Chappell), Tempo Seelster (Vincent Poulton), American Captain (Kenny Arsenault) and Superbo Hanover (Gordie Hennessey).
The back-up pace of the evening has Likely To Win as the morning line choice in race 12. Likely To Win has post seven in the $1,900 contest for driver Barrieau, trainer Adam Merner and owners Blenise Young and Lester Campbell of Nova Scotia and Jeffrey Campbell of Alberta. The five-year-old son of Western Terror was a winner in this class his last two starts back in 1:56.4 with Barrieau aboard. His main competition will come from Cambest Kisser from post two with Hughes in the bike and Van Zant with post four for driver Ron Matheson. Other entries are Oakrock Almighty (Hennessey), Painted Desert (Mark Bradley), Lucky Encounter (Arsenault), Eagle Jolt (Campbell) and The Big Bite (Mike Stevenson).
The evening trot class lines up in race four with Neal favoured for trainer-driver Brian Andrew, who shares in the ownership with William Andrew of Calgary. The seven-year-old Credit Winner stallion is dropping out of the Open ranks and draws post six.
To view Thursday's harness racing results, click on the following link: Thursday Results - Charlottetown Driving Park.
(With files from Red Shores)