Elimination winner Fallout forged first-over glory in the $1 million final of the Metro Pace, delivering as the 8-5 second choice to equal the 1:49.1 stakes and track record for two-year-old pacing colts on Saturday night, Sept. 21 at Woodbine Mohawk Park.

Blue Onyx (Doug McNair) blasted out of post nine for the front and cleared after the first eighth, though he quickly faced attacks from Prince Hal Hanover (Todd McCarthy) and then Captain Optimistic (Yannick Gingras) through a :26.2 first quarter. Prince Hal Hanover swept to the lead and Captain Optimistic, the 6-5 favourite, soon shot forward and seized the helm as the field began to stretch to a :54.4 half.

Driver Tim Tetrick had Fallout off the pylons moving up the backstretch, but never flushed a helmet to follow. So Tetrick sent Fallout forward on the rim and came looming after battle-weary leaders as they scurried by three-quarters in 1:22.1. Captain Optimistic clung to a diminishing lead once Prince Hal Hanover pulled pocket to assault, all the while Fallout continued to gain to the center of the track. Fallout reached the wheels of Prince Hal Hanover nearing the final eighth and sprung into another gear to slide by Prince Hal Hanover and win by a length. Captain Optimistic settled for third and Swingtown (Chris Page) rallied from third-over for fourth with Banderas (James MacDonald) completing the top five.

Fallout, besting his 1:49.3 lifetime-best performance in his Metro Pace elimination, equalled the 1:49.1 stakes record established by Tall Dark Stranger in 2019 as well as the divisional track record co-held by A Rocknroll Dance, who set the mark in his 2011 Metro elim. The time of the mile was one-fifth of a second off the Canadian record set by 2011 Breeders Crown champion Sweet Lou at Woodbine Racetrack.

“I was just kind of playing the race, and then I could see they were gonna play some chess early,” said Tetrick after the race. “Yannick still got a pretty easy first half. But you know, this colt just kept coming and digging, and we kept having a helmet to follow. When it mattered, he got to the wire first.”

A colt by 2012 Metro Pace winner Captaintreacherous out of the Aria Hanover, Fallout earned his third win from eight starts and has now banked $590,783 for owners Robert LeBlanc, Pryde Stables Inc., and Caviart Farms.

Tony Alagna trains the Brittany Farms-bred colt to add a fourth Metro Pace trophy to his mantel. He won with Captaintreacherous and then in 2014 with Artspeak and in 2020 with Exploit.

“This horse showed that he had the ability. It just looked like he was going to take a couple starts for him to get really fit and really into it,” said Alagna. "We took him to Kentucky, we raced him down there [a few times] and it looked like he was going to be [in] tough down there so we thought, ‘You know what? We have good luck in Canada. Let's take him to Metro and see what happens.’ And he just exploded up here. You know, he's been lights out both weeks.

“I thought the way Timmy raced him was going to get the miles in him that he needed to come up here,” said Alagna. “I think probably one of the biggest changes coming up here, we changed his bridal from Lexington to here, and we changed him to aluminum shoes. And, you know, aluminum shoes on the Lexington surface is kind of a 50/50 thing. But we know what they can do to a horse up here in Canada, and we made a decision to come up here. I said, ‘Okay, it's time to switch him to aluminum,’ so that really cleaned up his gate and I think that's kind of what put him over the top.”

Fallout paid $5.30 to win.

To view Saturday's harness racing results, click the following link: Saturday Results - Woodbine Mohawk Park.

(With files from Woodbine)