In this week's Rewind, Robert Smith recalls the day when a driver winning 200 races in a season was quite an accomplishment
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As recently as 1965, which is not exactly ancient history, no Canadian driver had ever won 200 races in a single season racing on home soil. That fact was true as the season began, but as the curtain fell at year's end the previously elusive barrier had been broken. The sport's fastest rising star, Ronnie Feagan - who turned 23 that year - was the first member of the "200" Club. As we look back at it now, who could have been a more fitting individual to hold this honour? To be the first at doing something is always special, even if that record is many times eclipsed.
Things were a lot different in those days. Full-scale year-round harness racing was not yet here; the age of the specialized trainer and the career catch driver was still off in the future. The thoughts of racing at one track in the afternoon and another at night would have drawn serious scorn although it may have happened at times. If it did, the reason was more to participate at a local Fair or special daytime stakes race. Generally speaking the opportunity just wasn't there.
At this time a driver often drew the attention of prospective clients as much as a trainer as by being an accomplished driver. Owners were often seeking a "package" deal, one in which they knew a horse would be properly trained and cared for as well as knowing at least a "good" driver was on board for every start. Maybe you didn't always have the hottest driver at the time, but people stuck with the person for the long term. It is amazing to look back at old programs and see where every horse in a race had the same driver shown for all, or nearly all of their previous starts.
In 1965 the Jockey Club included three tracks: Greenwood, Mohawk and the new Garden City Raceway at St. Catherines which had just opened the previous year. The racing season was still managed sort of by the "old rules", where races were not staged in the dead of winter. The season that year opened on Saturday, March 13 at Greenwood. Ronnie Feagan didn't win the first race (Fred Hill did) but he did win on opening day with his grandfather's 13-year-old gelding Lenas Pride C.
While the OJC tracks were a bit later opening, London did race in the winter months. However their schedule was much different than today as they raced only one day a week, usually on Saturday until the month of May. The drivers of that time were some of the perennial names of London's early years such as Don Corbett, "Jiggs" McFadden, Stan Williams and included young Ron Feagan who incidentally scored his first victory of the year on opening day January 2 behind Teddy Direct C for Goderich based owners Samis and Burke.
In the fall of 1965 a very significant event occurred with the opening of Windsor Raceway as a winter racing venue. This immediately expanded the length of the season which meant that months previously devoted to only training or "down" time became actual race dates. This signaled an era of much more racing and with it came more wins for a driver. For some time to come though if a driver won a lot of races, he probably trained a lot of horses too.
Today reaching the 200 win plateau for a driver won't necessarily make the headlines or break any records, but it is still considered a pretty good piece of work.