While Hockey Day in Canada was celebrated across the country this past Saturday with a live broadcast from Halifax, N.S., Mother Nature gave horsemen in the province a unique opportunity to lace up the blades a few days later.
Three-and-a-half hours northeast of Halifax, Inverness was hit with some flash freezing earlier this week. That weather system turned the half-mile track at Inverness Raceway into a sheer sheet of ice that prevented training of the 50 or so horses stabled at the track. However, the ice allowed for a different sort of physical activity as illustrated by horseman Hughie MacEachern.
Lanny Hanscombe told Trot Insider that MacEachern asked if he had his camera with him on Tuesday morning. When Lanscombe confirmed he did, MacEachern got on his Chicago Blackhawks jersey, skates and driving helmet, grabbed his stick and posed for a photo before going for a tour around the track sans Standardbred and jog cart.
The MacEachern name is well-known among hockey fans in Nova Scotia. Hughie's son Ali MacEachern was a stalwart defenseman and team captain with the Halifax Mooseheads, playing 265 games and accumulating 122 points over four years with the QMJHL club, ranking him in the franchise's top five for games played and points by defensemen. Ali, who also worked in the Standardbred business for years, was named the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League's Humanitarian of the Year in 2000-01, an award given to recognize one player for humanitarianism and community involvement.