His name may not have been too well known as he worked his way through his juvenile campaign last year, but by the time Elver Hanover was turned out for the season everyone knew what the son of Yankee Cruiser was all about. Grand Circuit wins, an unblemished nine-for-nine slate and a world record performance can tend to do that.
As racing fans patiently wait for the ‘glamour boys’ of 2020 to make their way back to the track, many believe that Elver Hanover could be among the select few that do some serious damage in the division.
Elver Hanover called it a season last year after his second consecutive score over the Red Mile’s marvelled surface. The first had come on September 28, which was a 1:48.3 world record win in a division of the Bluegrass Stakes. The second came on October 5, when he hit the lead before the half and went on to post a tidy, 1:50.3 victory in a division of the International Stallion Stakes.
While many of Elver Hanover’s cohorts went on to spar in the Breeders Crown and Matron Stakes, the $50,000 Harrisburg purchase was put away in great shape. When it comes to what 2020 holds for the speedster, fans are excited, as are Elver Hanover’s connections.
“I’ve heard that he’s doing well, but I haven’t heard too much… but I know that there are very high hopes for him this year,” Elver Hanover’s co-owner Jason Melillo recently said during the Ohio Harness Horsemen’s Association’s ‘Top of The Stretch’ podcast. “I was hoping that he was going to be able to race in the Breeders (Breeders Crown), but he wasn’t staked to it as a two-year-old, which is probably a blessing in disguise. He had a well-deserved rest on a very strong [season] and you don’t really want to burn out a two-year-old chasing after a lot of trophies.”
Fellow Elver Hanover co-owner Dr. Bridgette Jablonsky also discussed the gelding during the podcast. ‘Dr. J’ explained to host Roger Huston that she initially figured the winner of $363,450 in purses would either be a world beater or a nobody in his respective division.
“I think he could easily be some kid’s pony,” Dr. Jablonsky explained. “He’s not pony-sized, but he could easily be some kid’s riding horse because he’s that sweet and that mellow. I worried a little bit about that when he was a yearling because he was so laid back. You’d walk by his stall and he would just be laying down and you couldn’t startle him. But what impressed me about him is that when you turned him out in the paddock for somebody, or when we did his yearling video, you cluck to him and he went. So, he’s that horse that has the ability to be totally relaxed and then when you press the ‘go’ button, the ‘go’ is there.
“To me, I didn’t think he was going to be an overnight horse. He was either going to be good or he was not going to have the motivation, and I’m happy that it worked out.”
Elver Hanover, pictured victorious in his division of the Bluegrass Stakes.
Melillo had heard positive reports from Florida when Elver Hanover was training down last year, but in no way, shape or form could he have predicted what the bay would go on to do in 2019.
“He was somebody that I know Ronnie (trainer Ron Burke) liked,” said Melillo. “We didn’t get too much information when he was down in Florida, but the stuff that we did get from him was positive. I then heard that Dr. J was high on him, as well, and you don’t get endorsements that have a better resume than hers. The first time that I noticed that he was something special was the first race that he [competed in] down at Scioto – [he came from] nearly dead last at the three-quarters pole and came ahead to win it about three wide. I remember Page (driver Chris Page) got off the bike and I looked at him and was like ‘wow, this horse is something.’”
As Elver Hanover’s season unfolded, the results just got better and better. He was a beast in his Ohio Sires Stakes category and would end up being named the Ohio Harness Horsemen’s Association’s two-year-old pacing colt of the year. He was ultimately named the association’s horse of the year this past weekend during the group’s annual gala. Don’t let all the performances and accolades blind you, though – the connections were not one hundred percent sure what type of horse they had when they embarked on what turned out to be a special campaign.
“(With) two-year-olds, you never know what you’re going to get with them,” said Melillo. “Some of them look great out of the gate and then they can’t find their way the rest of the way, but he was good all year round. He won from any part of the track you put him on – he could win from the front, he could win from the back. In the race at Delaware (Ohio’s Delaware County Fair) they had that big tussle for the lead. He just hung back, and when he saw his opportunity Page (driver Chris Page) let him go. He wasn’t even at his best, but he won again. You don’t see that often.”