With the 2025 O'Brien Awards rapidly approaching, Trot Insider continues to shine the spotlight on this year's finalists for Canadian harness racing's top honours.

Another Great Mass, Ardonne and Strobe Lite comprise the three finalists in the Two-Year-Old Trotting Colt category.

At the end of 2020, a three-year-old trotting gelding was purchased by American interests after concluding his Ontario Sires Stakes (OSS) career with a win in the OSS Grassroots final — duplicating his two-year-old success. That horse, Lovedbythemasses, took a mark of 1:50.2 as a four-year and banked more than $916,000 while racing against the sport's top older trotters and establishing himself as one of the fastest Canadian-sired trotters in harness racing history.

Lovedbythemasses is a son of Muscle Mass out of the Northern Bailey mare Incredibility. He was trained through his two and three-year-old seasons by Ed Peconi for owner-breeder Wade Peconi of Stanchel, P.E.I. Those same connections have landed O'Brien Award consideration with Another Great Mass, the younger full brother to the accomplished trotter.

“He is one great horse, that’s for sure," trainer Ed Peconi told Trot Insider. "He’s always been sound, he’s always been healthy and I don’t know if he was as good as [full brother] Lovedbythemasses, but he’s starting to look that way.”

In 10 seasonal starts, Another Great Mass posted three wins with six top-two finishes while earning $220,166. He took his mark of 1:56.1 in a two-year-old open Woodbine Mohawk Park and capped his season with a second-place finish in the $300,000 OSS Super Final.

“I schooled him over Kawartha Downs a couple of times and he started getting a little hot, so I decided to take him to Mohawk. When I took him to Mohawk, I put Trevor [Henry] on him because I thought I could keep him for the year if [Another Great Mass] was any good at all. Trevor liked him, and it went from one thing to being better and better.”

Another first-time O'Brien Award finalist is trainer Megan Scran, who developed trotting colt Ardonne into a stakes-winning O'Brien Award contender.

A trip to Canada certainly suited Ardonne, as the son of Tactical Landing-Burberry broke his maiden in the 2025 William Wellwood elimination before uncorking a sizzling 1:52.4 effort in the Wellwood final. Ardonne finished his rookie season with those two wins and five top-two finishes from eight starts with $400,452 in purses for owner Philip Steinberg of Weston, Fl.

"It was pretty special to sweep the Wellwood elim and final and to equal the stakes record," said Scran. "He was really impressive that night and it still gives me goosebumps watching the replay."

Scran and partner Scott Zeron are no strangers to the O'Brien Awards, but the 2025 edition of the black tie gala means so much more when the effort, stress and attention to detail results in the recognition of top-tier talent.

"I’m looking forward to attending. I’ve attended them before but never for a horse I trained being nominated," noted Scran. "It’s so hard to compete at that level and to do it with a horse you picked out, broke and trained down is just an amazing feeling."

The connections of Strobe Lite hope their trotting gelding caught the attention of the voters as the third O'Brien Award finalist. A son of Alarm Detector-Shine Bright, Strobe Lite banked more than $379,000 during his rookie season for owner-trainer Ben Baillargeon, co-owner-breeder Glengate Farm and co-owners Claude Hamel and Nunzio Vena.

In 11 appearances, Strobe Lite finished in the top three nine times with driver James MacDonald piloting the rookie to all three of his wins, including the OSS Gold Super Final.

"Strobe Lite is the picture of a horse: big and beautiful," said MacDonald. "He has so much raw talent and speed. I can’t wait to get behind him again this year and see what he can do."

Breeder and co-owner Bullock indicated that the trotter's trainer also touted his talent from his early lessons.

“He’s a very nice colt and Ben has done a wonderful job with him, right from Day 1,” said Bullock after Strobe Lite's Super Final victory. “Ben was telling me [in the] spring that this is a good colt...We’ve had our ups and downs a little bit. He ran on us in the Mohawk Million, but that’s horse racing. If you don’t want horses to run, don’t buy trotters.”

This year marks the 37th edition of the O’Brien Awards, named in honour of the late Joe O’Brien, an outstanding horseman and Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame inductee. The winners will be announced at the O’Brien Awards Gala on Saturday, Jan. 31, 2026 at the J-AAR Expo Centre at Western Fair District in London, Ont.

(Standardbred Canada; photos courtesy New Image Media and Tiffany Chantel Photography)