Ontario-bred Thebestofjoel, handled by owner/trainer Ed Hensley, proved his wire-to-wire debut victory at Pompano Park in his last start was no fluke as the pair teamed up and used similar tactics for a repeat score in the $10,000 Open 1 Pace on Saturday night.
The five-year-old son of Cammibest, starting from the outside post in the septet, took the lead just a couple of strides out of the gate and clocked panels of :27.3, :55.1 and 1:23.1 en route to a victory measuring three parts of a length in 1:50.4.
Northern Companion, driven by Rob Hoffman, paced his final half in :55 to finish second while Lyons Johnny, with Wally Hennessey in the bike, finished third, just a length away. Cruizin K C was fourth while Next Flight In picked up the final award.
"You know, this horse has good gate speed -- he showed that last week -- and when the gate opened I didn't see that much early speed inside so I gunned him a bit right after the start to at least find a spot close up early," said Hensley in a post-race interview. "Well, he got to the front pretty easily. You know, when a horse shows you he's got 1:50 speed, you get a lot of confidence in him and after he reached the top pretty easily and in a manageable time I felt confident that he could do a repeat performance. He's got those :27 and a piece final quarters in him and when you're on top the others have to maybe go :26.4 or :27 to catch you. That's not easy when you're playing catch up! So, we were lucky again. And this is a very good bunch of Open horses here, so I'm proud of this guy's performance."
For Thebestofjoel, the win was his fifth of the year in 22 starts and sent his seasonal earnings to $62,262. He's banked $210,869 lifetime and sports a Meadowlands mark of 1:49.4.
(With files from Pompano Park)