Elista Hanover has triumphed in all three Pennsylvania Sires Stake preliminary legs, and she’s won 10 of 13 starts this year. So it seems bizarre to say the sophomore filly trotter is on a losing streak. Yet she’s dropped her last two and will be looking to right the ship in her $71,399 USD PASS division on Thursday, Aug. 29 at Hollywood Casino at The Meadows.

The program also features a $40,000 USD PA Stallion Series event for three-year-old filly trotters. First post is 12:45 p.m.

Those two recent defeats for the daughter of International Moni-Evermore came against top-shelf company — a fourth place finish in the Delmonica Hanover, and a seventh-placed sixth result in the final of the Hambletonian Oaks where she was sent off the even-money favourite.

Yet Annie Stoebe, who trains Elista Hanover and owns with R. Lynn Curry and Philomena Curry, reports that she had excuses unrelated to the calibre of the competition.

“She scoped very sick after the Hambletonian Oaks, and we had to get her healthy,” Stoebe says. “In the Delmonica Hanover, she choked down at the gate. She’d never done that before, but she decided to grab on at the gate.”

In response, Stoebe has switched her from a leather bit to a plain snaffle bit, and still another possible change will be a race-time call.

“We may go to cheek pieces rather than a closed bridle. That depends on how she warms up.”

Stoebe indicated Elista Hanover won’t race at the Red Mile but is targeting the Breeders Crown.  The $240,000 yearling acquisition has banked $307,244, and Stoebe notes that her family typically improves with age.

“As long as she finishes the year strong,” she says, “our intentions are to bring her back at four.”

Elista Hanover goes from post four, in race six, with regular driver David Miller aboard.

(Meadows Standardbred Owners Association)