Custard Dolce is something else. Breathing a rarefied air that is different from what other horses take in, Custard Dolce appears to be in a class all of her own as she demonstrated one more time this past weekend at Calgary’s Century Downs with yet another powerfully easy triumph in an elimination for the upcoming $103,160 Gord & Illa Rumpel Memorial Stakes on Saturday, Aug. 2.

“You dream about horses like this,” said winning driver Phil Giesbrecht of the extremely talented three-year-old filly. “I’m so excited and fortunate to drive her. She’s just an amazing filly.”

Magic.

Winning by an eased up 4-1/4 lengths in 1:56.2, Custard Dolce won it with a gasping move around the final turn. Sitting third, Giesbrecht said he didn’t even ask the three-year-old filly when he pulled her to the outside.

“I just let her do her thing. She just took off. I said to myself ‘Holy cow,’” said Giesbrecht, who was along for the ride as Custard Dolce swept easily into a lead she wouldn’t come close to relinquishing. 

Giesbrecht, who recently surpassed $10 million in career earnings as a driver, was Century Mile’s leading driver in Edmonton last year and won the Western Regional Driving Championship presented by Standardbred Canada at Century Downs. He is coming off back-to-back seasons of $1 million-plus winnings and is on pace for the hat trick.

“I was pretty impressed,” Giesbrecht said of Century Downs’ two-year-old track record (1:54) holder. “She was pretty much all on her own. I tapped her once in the stretch when she started looking around at the crowd. Otherwise, she was golden."

No kidding.

Custard Dolce lost her first start last year and then lost the Shirley McClellan Breeders Stakes by a nose on June 21 this summer. Otherwise, perfect. Fifteen career starts. Thirteen wins. Incredibly all 13 wins were in stakes.

And Giesbrecht said it was the weather that caused her loss in the McClellan.

“It was a hurricane,” said Giesbrecht. “Fifty K winds, pouring rain and she had to give Mademechangemymind cover the entire way. She didn’t get beat. The weather beat her.”

There were two other things that cost Custard Dolce in the McClellan.

One, is that she hadn’t raced in three weeks before the McClellan and only had two races in a span of six months -- both, of course, that she won before that $118,000 stakes.

The other factor is that Custard Dolce is much better coming from off the pace as opposed to racing from the front which is also what happened in the McClellan.

“She loves to have a target,” said Custard Dolce’s trainer, breeder and co-owner Jamie Gray. “If she’s got a target, she’s going by. If there’s a horse in front of her, she’s going to catch it.

“I train all of my horses to be finishers. I train them all from the rear,” continued Gray, who shares partnership in Custard Dolce with Jackson Wittup of Calgary, Max Gibb of Millarville and former driver/trainer Derek Wilson of Heritage Pointe, Alta. “I want all my horses to finish their miles.”

Custard Dolce, who was purchased at the Alberta Standardbred Horse Association Yearling Sale for $26,500, has already won nearly $246,000. With more to come.

“We’ve got a lot of stakes races left like the Century Casino Filly Pace and the $75,000 Super Finals in Alberta,” said Gray, who used to have Custard Dolce’s dam, Blue Star West. “But after this season is over, I’m taking her to [Woodbine] Mohawk [Park] in Ontario. I really want to see what kind of damage she can do there.

“I think she’ll learn to race from the front and cut one out. But not right now. She’s very intelligent.

“She’s got tremendous gate speed,” continued Gray. “She’s so fast especially for a horse her size. She’s a big mare but in three strides she’s in full flight.”

“She gets lost if she’s all by herself,” chimed Giesbrecht.

"She's just an amazing filly, an absolute dream to drive,” added Giesbrecht, 35, a native of Manitoba who drove on the fair circuits in Manitoba and Saskatchewan before making his move to Alberta in 2008. “Jamie's done a fantastic job.”

Hurrikane Alley won the other elimination of the Rumpel in 1:56.4 for her fourth career victory in 17 lifetime starts.

owned by Robert Jones of Stony Plain and Archie Benekos of Calgary, Hurrikane Alley was sent away at 5-2 odds and got a clever drive from Dave Kelly, slipping through along the rail inside pacesetter Imashipwreck and on to a head victory over Blowing Inthe Wind and determined favourite Georgia Hanover.

Hurricane Alley is trained by Nathan Sobey, who is recovering from a bad spill last month when he broke a T2 vertebrae and cracked his left shoulder blade. 

There were two other stakes eliminations on Saturday’s Century Downs card -- those for the Ralph Klein Memorial for three-year-old colts and geldings.

In the first Ralph Klein elimination, it was Sobey again -- this time with Hands Off Harry, who went wire-to-wire winning like a 1-9 favourite should look like winning most comfortably by 5-1/2 lengths in 1:543.

“Mike [driver Hennessy] told me Hands Off Harry was well within himself, which is the way it looked to me,” said Sobey, always one of Alberta’s top trainers.

The victory was Hands Off Harry’s fourth in a row and seventh in 12 career starts. He is looking like this weekend’s top choice again. Second five times making him never worse than second in his brief career, Hands Off Harry is a very formidable opponent.

“He’s a nice horse,” said Sobey. “Very athletic.

“With the win, I get to choose my post for Saturday’s final so I’m very pleased with the way the day went especially with Hurricane Alley winning a leg of the Rumpel as well.

“He’s Ontario-bred so I couldn’t race him in the restricted Alberta-bred races,” Sobey explained, adding that his parents bought Hands Off Harry’s dam Hands Off Hanover in foal and then shipped to Alberta.

Most unfortunately, Hands Off Hanover died of colic a couple of months after she got to Alberta.

So, instead of the stakes route to the Western Canada Pacing Derby, Hands Off Harry glided through his condition races, once winning by more than 10 lengths, another time by five lengths and a third by four lengths.

Now this romp.

A stakes winner, he won this past spring’s Ray Gemmill at B.C.’s Fraser Downs. It will be most interesting to see what pace scenario develops this Saturday between him and another speedster, Discontinued, who also made it through the eliminations after finishing fourth to Momas Work Of Art.

The latter got a great drive by Dave Kelly, who sat right behind Discontinued but got shuffled back when Discontinued tired. But Momas Work Of Art and Kelly were somehow able to wend their way through heavy traffic in the stretch to get up in time and win by a length over Outlawminutbyminut in 1:55.2.

Like Custard Dolce, Wittup -- striking lightning again -- is also a part owner of Momas Work Of Art along with Don Monkman Jr. and trainer Shelly Arsenault.

“It’s unbelievable,” Wittup said in this space a year ago.

A fixture in horse racing in Alberta for 50 years, Wittup went on to say, “It’s not supposed to happen this way, but I’ll enjoy it. I shake my head and enjoy every second of it. It’s overwhelming really.”

Momas Work Of Art has now won five of his 14 starts and banked more than $120,000.

On Saturday, Century Downs will be hosting Libations Fest. In addition to thrilling harness racing, guests can purchase tickets to sample local breweries, wineries, and cideries, with proceeds supporting Horse Racing Alberta’s Backstretch Foundation.

“The entire Standardbred season has been building to this moment,” said Jackie Morrison, General Manager at Century Downs. “These are the most anticipated races of the year, and Libations Fest adds an incredible atmosphere to an already thrilling day.”

Alberta Standardbred Horse Association’s Executive Director Nancy Retzlaff added, “The best three-year-olds will compete for more than $200,000, honouring the late Ralph Klein, as well as Gord and Illa Rumpel, long time champions of horse racing in Alberta.”

The fields for the Ralph Klein and Gord & Illa Rumpel Memorial Stakes are listed below. Post time for the 12-race card is 12:45 p.m. (MDT).

$103,160 Gord & Illa Rumpel Memorial Stakes (Race 8)
Post - Horse - Driver - Trainer - Morning Line Odds    
1. Hurrikane Alley - David Kelly - Nathan Sobey - 8-1
2. Custard Dolce - Phil Giesbrecht - Jamie Gray - 2-5
3. Imashipwreck - Jacques Lambert - Jacques Lambert - 30-1
4. Blowing Inthe Wind -  James Jungquist - Harold Haining - 15-1
5. Georgia Hanover - Kelly Hoerdt - Chris Lancaster - 12-1
6. Mademechangemymind - Mike Hennessy - Nathan Sobey - 10-1
7. Threecurtaincalls - Brandon Campbell - Brandon Campbell - 20-1
8. Chics Dragon Flies - Logan Gillis - Chris Lancaster - 30-1

$118,400 Ralph Klein Memorial Stakes (Race 10)
Post - Horse - Driver - Trainer - Morning Line Odds 
1. Hands Off Harry - Mike Hennessy -  Nathan Sobey - 6-5
2. Momas Work Of Art - David Kelly - Shelly Arsenault - 7-2
3. Summer Dancer - Phil Giesbrecht - Chris Lancaster - 10-1
4. Discontinued - Brandon Campbell - Brandon Campbell - 9-2
5. Worldsgreatestsin - J.F. Gagne - Brandon Campbell - 20-1
6. Outlawminutbyminut - Logan Gillis - Logan Gillis - 6-1
7. Captain Keys - Kelly Hoerdt - Kelly Hoerdt - 30-1
8. Miso Hanover - Gilles Bouvier - Logan Gillis - 30-1
9. Take Out Hanover - James Jungquist - David Lamont - 30-1
AE1. Ima Rum Runner - Mike Hennessy - Nathan Sobey

To view Saturday's complete harness racing entries, click the following link: Saturday Entries - Century Downs.

(With files from Century and Curtis Stock / thehorses.com)