Middleton Back Behind The Mic Monday

When harness racing resumes on Monday evening (Jan. 15) at Woodbine Mohawk Park, a familiar voice will be echoing throughout the grandstand once again as the track's regular announcer, Ken Middleton, returns to race-calling action after a six-month hiatus.

Middleton, who trains his own stable in addition to his announcing role, sustained serious injuries including multiple fractured vertebrae in a training accident this past June leaving a long and arduous road to recovery ahead. That road continues but has now led Middleton back to the announcer's booth as he takes his next step in restoring a sense of normalcy to his life. 

"The surgeon who operated on me said, 'You're a very lucky man.' He said, 'You should be paralyzed, if not dead, considering what happened.' And so when you're able to get up out of bed and get out of the hospital and get back to life, you really start to respect all those little things that so many of us take for granted," Middleton told Trot Insider. "But then as you come back and you get a chance to embrace them, you realize how great it is to be able to get normalcy back into your life step by step. That's the next part of getting normalcy back to my life --- returning to work, getting to see my work friends, my colleagues, you know, all that stuff. So, it's just the next step of getting back closer to where I was before the accident." 

Middleton said he was overwhelmed by the outpouring of support he received from family, friends, racing participants and fans when the accident happened and appreciates everyone who took time out of their days to wish him well. He also expressed gratitute to his network of support throughout his ongoing recovery, including his mom Judy, brother Keith and sister-in-law Tanya, niece Kendal and girlfriend Sarah Gray.
 
"Without them, I would have just had to fold up shop, but they carried the load. And it's great, it's brought our family closer together actually and they continue to come to the barn and we appreciate it, we like doing it, it's fun. But yeah, I owe them an incredible amount of gratitude and thanks for carrying on with the horses and stuff like that."

Middleton, who discussed his struggles with surgical complications, mobility and nerve pain from the accident in the December 2023 issue of TROT Magazine, is hoping for a smooth transition as his focus starts to shift back towards his race-calling duties this week. He is looking forward to the comaraderie of his colleagues and watching the races themselves.

"I honestly didn't watch a lot of races because, quite frankly, I couldn't stay awake long enough to watch them at night and it wasn't my main focus," said Middleton. "My main focus was to try and get better, get healthy and I was so fixated on doing that because I just wanted to get better. And that's what I really made my number one goal. I just wanted to get healthy so I could get up and around and enjoy those things that I like doing in life, which I wasn't able to do for quite a while."

Middleton will be back calling Monday night's 11-race program, which begins at 7:10 p.m.

(Standardbred Canada)