White Birch Farm's homebred, six-year-old pacing mare Darlins Delight, is in the hunt for her 30th career victory Sunday in the $250,000 Betsy Ross
at Harrah's Chester Racetrack, outside Philadelphia.
She also has $2.7 million in earnings and a 1:49.1 mark (established as a four-year-old) to go with those wins. In 2006, she won the Dan Patch Award as harness racing's best three-year-old filly pacer.
Though she has been moderately raced, with never more than 16 starts a year, Darlins Delight put up 19 of her wins before she was four, racing predominately, but not entirely, on the New York Sire Stakes circuit.
"She had 14 starts as a two-year-old, which is a lot," trainer Jeff Stafford said. "Four or five of them were, I don't want to say easy, but the way she was as a two-year-old, around some of those New York tracks, she didn't have to go so fast and it worked out easy, if you can call it that."
Stafford says Darlins Delight, now in her fifth season of racing, gets a full vacation between the seasons that have seen her win stakes like the $709,100 Fan Hanover, $531,880 Three Diamonds, Milton Stakes and this year, the final of the Overbid series.
"Her shoes get pulled and she goes in the field," Stafford said. "She stays in the barn [at night] but she goes out on the field every day, but that's about it - probably two months every time. Her attitude is great. If she wasn't in the race barn, I don't think she'd be happy. She looks forward to going on the track and doing her job. When you put her on the trailer to go to the races, she perks right up and she's ready to go."
Darlins Delight has multiple strengths, says her trainer.
"I've always thought she was better from behind, but as she gets older, it seems like she races good on the front when she has to," Stafford said. "You can race her, you can leave, take her off [the gate], pretty much do what you want."
Stafford expects to see Darlins Delight, who he's trained since she was a yearling, for a while to come. There are no plans for a new career - motherhood - for Darlins Delight.
"She's going as long as she stays healthy and good," he said.
Darlins Delight finished third in last year's Betsy Ross, behind Southwind Tempo and My Little Dragon. On April 19, she won her elimination race for this year's event, beating Southwind Tempo, Martha Maxine, and Go On BB. The other elim was won by Four Starzz Meliss, over Arts Diva, My Little Dragon, and Spring Break.
The field for the Betsy Ross features three former Dan Patch Award winners, with My Little Dragon (a multiple honoree) and Southwind Tempo joining Darlins Delight.
(Harness Racing Communications)