On Sunday, August 13 at Yonkers Raceway, odds-on favourite Homicide Hunter (Brent Holland, $3.70) won his third consecutive $68,000 Open Handicap Trot.
Away fourth from behind the eight-ball among the dozen, Homicide Hunter saw Smalltownthrowdown (driven by Greg Merton) and Hemi Seelster (Jason Bartlett) takes turns fronting the field (:28.1, :57.2, 1:27.2).
Homicide Hunter was then out and moving and set his sights upon the leader. He dove into a ‘rest stop’ past the 1:55.1 milepost when Smalltownthrowdown backed away.
‘Hunter’ then became the hunted on the final turn. He found himself with a three-length lead after Hemi Seelster made a wild break and a hard right turn back down into the paddock before having completed his appointed rounds.
Homicide Hunter went on to win the race easily, as he defeated Dewycolorintheline (Dan Dube) by more than four lengths in 2:26 for the mile-and-a-quarter. Last week’s upsetter, Taco Tuesday (Steve Smith), was third, with Sumatra (Eric Goodell) and Theraputic (George Brennan) picked up the remainder.
For Homicide Hunter, a five-year-old Mr Cantab gelding owned by Crawford Farms Racing and trained by Chris Oakes, it was his sixth win in nine seasonal starts. The exacta paid $51, the triple returned $389.50, and the superfecta paid $2,118.
Sunday’s installment of the ‘New York, New York Double’ offered a winning combination of 2-Kelsocait (Saratoga’s third race) and 11-Awsome Valley (Yonkers’ fifth race) paid $44 for every correct $1 wager. Total pool was $5,623.
Please note that Yonkers’ post time next Sunday (August 20) will be at 12:30 p.m.
(With files from Yonkers Raceway)