Eric Carlson wasted no time in recording his 3,000th career victory Monday night at The Downs at Mohegan Sun Pocono, taking the first race of the night with Call Me Richard for the milestone victory.

Call Me Richard pressed forward to control the pace over Monday’s sloppy racetrack at Pocono, and he opened up a large lead towards the three-quarter pole. In the stretch Holy Halibut, second choice to the winning favourite, made up some late ground, but Carlson kept after his charge and crossed the wire in 1:57.3 mile.

The 42-year-old Carlson was half that age when he won his first race, a FFA pace worth $930, at the Fowlerville MI fair with Calamity Clyde. Eric grabbed industry attention in 2010, when he won 603 races, sixth-highest in North America, while dominating the Detroit circuit. He soon afterwards decided to take his driving skills eastward, with his earnings benefiting from the transplantation: his best money year was 2014, when his horses brought in $5.3 million of his career $27.3 million tally.

Sharen Hanover and Kimberlee both recorded their second victories in the Bobby Weiss Series for pacing females on Monday night at Pocono Downs

The Well Said mare Sharen Hanover is now perfect in two starts for the brothers Allard, driver Simon and trainer Rene, as she quarter-moved to command and went on to win her $15,000 division of the series’ third preliminary leg. Three lengths clear at the end of a 1:55.3 mile in “sloppy +2” conditions, the mare appears to be peaking at just the right time for owner Geoffrey Mound.

In the other section, the Rock N Roll Hanover filly Kimberlee, who won in the first round and then sat out last week, raced just off a contested pace, then caught the series’ only double winner in the first two prelims, Miss Hill, by a half-length in 1:55.4. Marcus Miller was in the sulky behind the winner, now undefeated in three seasonal starts, for trainer Åke Svanstedt and the ownership of Knutsson Trotting Inc. and Asa Sjoberg.

(PHHA/Pocono)