No account of the career of Keith Waples could ever be thought of as complete without at least a brief description of one of the truly defining moments in Canadian harness racing history.
To honour one of the greatest horsemen in the history of harness racing, the Standardbred Canada website will feature a five-part series on the legendary Keith Waples as he approaches his 90th birthday.
Penned by writer Robert Smith, this is the third of five SC web exclusive web features on one of racing's most revered individuals.
The Miracle Mile
Mighty Dudley's sub-2:00 win is said to have elevated the sport in Canada to an entirely new level. As an indication of the difficulty in recording a mile at this speed, the next 2:00 mile did not occur until almost two years later and it took eight years before the tenth 2:00 mile was recorded in Canada.
Back on the evening of July 21, 1959 at Richelieu Park in Montreal history was truly written by a horse named Mighty Dudley -- co-owned, trained and driven by Keith Waples. On that evening, despite starting in the second tier and being well back, they recorded the first ever sub 2:00 mile in Canadian racing history. The official clocking was 1:59.3. It was a time when Canadian harness racing enjoyed its finest hour.
Following a near 2:00 mile the previous week with a similar field of horses, the long awaited "Miracle Mile" was accomplished. The race was a thrilling affair and like many races did not fully unfold until the final stages. The race favourite and early leader was the great mare Chief Maid, driven by Benoit Cote. Cote, in a reminiscence of the race written many years later, gave his account in which described his utter amazement at not winning the race. He said, "We passed the half in less than a minute and I still had a lot of horse left. But before I even realized what was going on, Mighty Dudley and Waples came rushing past me and that was it ..." The great performance by Chief Maid, who ended up finishing second, is still given much of the credit for this record setting mile.
Keith Waples immediately placed himself in an elite and unique place in Canadian harness racing history by recording this tremendous mile. A portion of the story that is almost forgotten is that the horse's owner was ready to give up on Mighty Dudley, but at Waples' insistence he was kept in training. At the age of four, Mighty Dudley came of age. He was given a $2,000 bonus by the Richelieu track and in typical Waples fashion commented many years later with "I wonder what I did with that money...?"
Harness writer Hans Grottke summed up the event in the Montreal Gazette by saying "The elusive 2:00 mile, the last major stumbling block to Canada's full emergence as a racing power was cracked in startling fashion at Richelieu Park last evening."
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