A training triple and a five-bagger a la the race bike gave veteran horseman Ted McDonald plenty of reasons to be chipper on Thursday evening at Rideau Carleton Raceway

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McDonald was blanked throughout the first six races, but he did plenty of winning during the balance of the 14-race program.

He clicked with a classy claimer named Wobbly Legs (1:57.3) in Race 7 before catch-driving Dillman (2:02.4) to victory in Race 9 for trainer John MacMillan.

Average Joe (2:00) eked out a narrow score one race later, thus completing the driving hat-trick and giving McDonald his second training win on the card. The Bernard Emond-trained Baby Vegas (2:00) led for most of the mile in Race 11, and in doing so gave McDonald the natural hat trick and the driving Grand Slam.

Orfeus (2:02.2) capped off the card with a half-length victory for trainer/driver McDonald, who could do little wrong on the Thursday evening card.

A career winner of 2,748 races and purses in excess of $11.6 million, McDonald will set his sights on surpassing the $1 million mark in purse earnings for the fifth consecutive season.

To view Thursday’s results, click here.