The Scarlet blood has been around for four generations producing a trail of Maritime stars for the MacLean family, including last year’s standout two-year-old trotting filly Scarlet Patti

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Darryl MacLean trains and drives the homebred daughter by PJs Nabby out of the Maritime champion Scarlet Nite, while his father Gord MacLean, a longtime hobby horseman, holds the ownership papers.

Darryl, a financial officer for Veteran Affairs in Charlottetown, also took up racing as a hobby with his father and enjoyed early success with pacing colt Kilkerran Direct in mid-80s. Since that time, the MacLean’s have focused their attention to raising and racing trotters.

“My father had bought a broodmare [Scarlet Spur] that was by Ayres and that’s how the Scarlets all came about,” said Darryl, whose daughter, Natasha, also helped with the horses while growing up, making the Scarlet operation a complete family affair.

Four Scarlet generations and multiple champions later, Scarlet Patti was born.

“Scarlet Patti was actually a very aggressive yearling; not mean, but just aggressive and when you did the breaking you had to be ready to move quickly because she sometimes did a little jumping through the field, but once we broke her to the cart she was fine,” said MacLean of the filly named after her birth date - St. Patrick’s Day.

“She was very serious about her business when she did it. She always walked with a purpose. She trained well. She trained down until April [2009] and then we had a setback with her where she hurt herself in her front leg.”

Advised to give Scarlet Patti a week off, MacLean opted to play it safe and waited a full month before resuming her training schedule. After over a week of jogging and some slow training trips, ‘Patti’ settled into a routine of training every three days to be ready for the start of her stakes season in mid-July. By the end of June, she was ready to qualify, but got off to a rocky start making breaks in her first three qualifiers.

“When she’d get behind the gate and the gate would take off she’d lunge after the gate and then she’d make a break leaving so I changed a little bit of equipment on her,” explained MacLean, who added half hopples and a Z guide. “From that point on she was manageable and did everything you’d want.”

Scarlet Patti won her first Atlantic Sires Stakes event on July 14 at Summerside Raceway and followed that up with a pair of second place finishes before rolling off 10 consecutive stakes victories including the Atlantic Breeders Crown, and the Maritime Breeders and Island Breeders finals. All-in-all, Scarlett Patti banked $35,631. Once Scarlet Patti got rolling there was no catching her as she dominated her fellow freshman trotters winning most of her races by open lengths. The sum of her winning margins was nearly 72 lengths.

“For a filly that is a little grabby in warm up or post parade, one of her biggest assets is when she goes behind the gate she actually lets me decide what we’re doing. She floats out, she can leave or she’ll sit in a hole all day. Her biggest attribute to her streaking is the fact that the farther the mile goes, the stronger she gets. She’s probably a strong candidate to go long distances other than a mile. She’s actually at her strongest point finishing as she is at any point in the mile.”

After her freshman season ended in early November, Scarlet Patti was turned out at the MacLean’s Winsloe farm for a short winter break. After only six weeks of paddock time, MacLean opted to begin a light exercise routine with the energetic filly.

“Our winters come early and last late and she’s such a good feeling horse that I started jogging her after only six weeks for the fear that she might get too much energy and she might hurt her herself out in the snow and ice. So while she was jogging we kept the edge off her and I could turn her out daily for about an hour of paddock time.

“I started training her in February,” continued MacLean, who uses the training facility of his neighbour - Dr. Ian Moore. “She’s got a ton of work in her; she’s well ahead of where she should be.

“She went into the season and came out of it as healthy as you’d want and as sound as you can have and appears to be coming back the same way,” said MacLean, noting that Scarlet Patti’s growth was marginal. “She’s a little taller and longer but she was a really good sized two-year-old. She’s fairly thick. She’s built more like a stallion as opposed to some of the other mares I’ve had but she’s just an all-around nice mare.”

With the stake season for trotters still about a month away in the Maritimes, MacLean says Scarlet Patti is yearning for some racing action.

“She’s been getting a little bored. She wants to get down to racing. She’s doing everything that I would expect or ask of her.”

Scarlet Patti’s training buddy, three-year-old trotting colt Scarlet Equinox, has already qualified. ‘Patti’ is in to go in the third qualifier on Saturday night at Charlottetown Driving Park and MacLean is pointing her towards another stakes-packed campaign.

“The mother has been a real good producer for us,” said MacLean, who noted that Scarlet Patti’s yearling half-sister by Northern Bailey, Scarlet Vicki, will be the last offspring from the 25-year-old Scarlet Nite.