Two decades ago, Tim Lane purchased a yearling filly named Prayinfordaylight. She was the third horse he ever owned, and although she never won a race, her impact on Lane’s future in harness racing remains evident.

On Thursday (April 28), one of Prayinfordaylight’s grandkids, Moved Bythe Spirit, will be in action in the $50,000 James K. Hackett Memorial final for Ohio-sired three-year-old pacing males at Miami Valley Raceway. Lane trains the homebred gelding, who will start from post 3 with driver Tyler Smith in a field of eight.

For his career, Moved Bythe Spirit has hit the board in eight of 13 races, winning four and earning $42,313. He was slowed by foot woes late last season, but not before capturing three preliminary divisions of the Buckeye Stallion Series and finishing second in another. He also had a victory and second in Ohio Fair Stakes action.

“I think he could have raced in the [Ohio] Sire Stakes last year, but I was pretty conservative with him,” said Lane, who owns Moved Bythe Spirit with Storm Haven LLC. “His last couple races when all the money was on the line, he had some hoof issues that cost him quite a bit of money.

“But he’s been a joy. He’s just a good, honest, boy.”

Lane’s family has long been involved in harness racing — his cousin Jim Arledge Jr. has won nearly 2,200 races as a trainer — and Lane was active in the sport while growing up. He put equine pursuits on hold while going to Bowling Green to play football and, after graduating, to design and construct golf courses.

He began buying racehorses in 1999 and Prayinfordaylight entered his life two years later.

“She wasn’t much of a racehorse, but we have a problem falling in love with them, so we made her a broodmare,” Lane said. “That’s been a good family for us.”

Prayinfordaylight’s first foal was Lord I Apologize, who had some success on the Ohio Sire Stakes circuit and is the dam of the Western Vintage-sired Moved Bythe Spirit. Lord I Apologize has produced four foals of racing age, all with at least one win.

“Lord I Apologize was a very good racehorse for us, so we decided to keep and breed her,” Lane said. “She’s produced pretty well for us.”

Moved Bythe Spirit enters Thursday’s Hackett final off a fifth-place finish in last week’s elimination. It was his second start of the season. He was seventh, beaten by three lengths, against older horses in his 2022 debut.

“He did grow up a little bit [from age two],” said Lane, who began training in 2011 and has a 19-horse stable. “He filled out. He’s a nice, big, horse. He’s a little bit flighty, a little bit hot, at times. But he’s got a great mouth. You can use him on the front, you can sit; he’s just a good versatile horse.”

Lane will determine Moved Bythe Spirit’s schedule after the Hackett but hopes to race the horse in the Ohio Sire Stakes this year rather than in the Buckeye Stallion Series.

“We’ll see how he comes out of [the Hackett], but we’ll probably race him in the first leg of the Sire Stakes and see how he does,” Lane said. “There are some really nice Ohio-bred three-year-olds. We’ll see how it pans out. We’ll see if we can hang with the big boys and go from there.”

No matter what, the experience with Moved Bythe Spirit has been gratifying.

“We foaled him at the house, we raised him, we broke him; he’s never been out of our sight his whole career,” Lane said. “The ones like that, there’s the pride of getting them where they need to be and making racehorses out of them.

“It’s very special.”

Seaside Way, one of five Ron Burke-trained Hackett finalists, is the 2-1 morning-line favourite Thursday. He finished second to stablemate Barrys Berries, the 5-2 second choice, in the elimination.

Burke’s horses swept the top-four spots in the elim, with Terminator (4-1 in the final) and Rose Run Xplosion (10-1) following Barry’s Berries and Seaside Way. Earlier this month, Seaside Way won the final of the Omar Hiteman Memorial Series, a conditioned event, at Miami Valley.

Racing begins at 4:05 p.m. (EDT) at Miami Valley Raceway. For Thursday’s complete entries, click here. The Hackett Memorial is race 10 on the 14-race card.

(USTA)