Live racing was conducted in front of an empty grandstand on Saturday (March 14) at Miami Valley Raceway. The grandstand was empty due to a shutdown caused by the Coronavirus crisis. The program of racing was exciting nonetheless, and was enjoyed by numerous new off-track fans, as evidenced by a higher-than-normal handle.

Miller, the leading dash driver at the current Miami Valley meet, was intent on dictating the fractions as the 1-2 favourite in the Williams Memorial. It took Gold Digger King most of the intial :27 quarter to gain control, then the four-year-old son of Pet Rock put up middle fractions of :55.1 and 1:23 over the rain dampened "sloppy" track.

A final :29 split was enough to hold off Diesel Accelerator, who sat a pocket trip throughout, and the lengthy first-over bid of Dashing To Da Wire. The 1:52 win was the seventh of the Scott Mogan trainee’s young career and increased his career bounty to $171,097.

Linda Van Camp owns Gold Digger King, who paid $3.00 to win. Brett Miller sat in the sulky. The exacta paid $11 and the "chalky" 50-cent trifecta returned just $9.05.

A contentious $24,000 Open Pace earlier on the card was captured by My Hero Ron, who was a head better than fast-closing Hallies Comet and just a length better than Gerardo who made all the pace in the race before tiring to a third place finish in the 1:52.3 mile. My Hero Ron in now just one win away from millionaire status as the victory lifted his overall bounty to $990,663. The eight-year-old Well Said gelding has amassed 36 wins from 167 starts and owns a 1:49.2 record taken five seasons ago.

Dan Dubeansky trains My Hero Ron for owner Brian Witt.

Miami Valley will continue live racing, with no live fans, on Sunday afternoon at 2:05 p.m. Those wishing to watch and/or wager on the races can head to miamivalleygaming.com/racing/ where they can find links to advance deposit wagering platforms and also find a link to enable downloading of the program pages courtesy of the USTA.

(With files from Miami Valley Raceway)