While the ultra-hot Ramegade Bruiser will aim to duplicate last week's Spring Pacing Championship success on Saturday night at Woodbine Racetrack, a veteran of the pacing wars shoots for double millionaire status
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After his wire-to-wire triumph in last week’s opening round of the Spring Pacing Championship at Woodbine, no-one expects anything but a repeat from six-year-old Ramegade Bruiser, in this Saturday night’s sequel.
After all, the durable son of Rambaran has won eight of his last 10 starts, and has pocketed almost $170,000 this season already. And with his chief rival in this series, Secrets Nephew, out of action at the moment, he has only five other mature pacers to best in order to take home another tidy $25,000 from the series second leg.
Of those five, Eagle Luck probably represents the most credible threat. The six-year-old gelding returned to racing mid-March after an extended winter break, and took a couple of starts to get his groove back – but a 1:51.1 victory last week in a $35,000 condition event at Woodbine proved he’s coming back into winning form.
Jody Jamieson will be in the bike for Eagle Luck, who is currently listed at 3-1 odds, while Chris Christoforou will do the steering for 2-5 favourite, Ramegade Bruiser.
The open pacers will face off on Saturday night, April 4, in race #2, post time 7:51 p.m. The $91,000 (est.) final of the Spring Pacing Championships is slated for Saturday, April 11.
Stalwart pacing gelding, Escape The Wind, has scored a staggering 51 wins, 22 seconds, and 22 thirds in his six-year, 172-start racing career. Now he’s chasing down another milestone: $2 million in earnings, which he’ll surpass if he is first or second this
coming Saturday in a $40,000 Preferred event at Woodbine racetrack.
Trained and driven from the beginning of his career by WEG driving colony star, Roger Mayotte, nine-year-old Escape The Wind has made brief sojourns south of the border, but has spent most of his time on the ovals at Mohawk and Woodbine. Among his stakes victories were the 2003 Provincial Cup at Windsor Raceway, divisions of the 2003 Bluegrass Stakes and Tattersalls Stakes at the Red Mile, the 2003 Summertime Pacing Series final at Woodbine, a division of the 2004 Aquarius Stakes at the Meadowlands, the $104,500 Pacing Classic at Woodbine in June, 2005, and the $250,000 (US) American National Final at Balmoral Park, that same year. He also defeated Canadian Horse of the Year, Admirals Express, in the $100,000 Invitational Gold Cup at Woodbine in October, 2005, and repeated the feat in the 2007 edition of the Gold Cup, defeating Silent Swing and Tell All. In addition, Escape The Wind was second by a head to No Pan Intended in the 2003 Breeders’ Crown.
For the past two seasons, Escape The Wind has been a regular in the conditioned events for older pacers at the two WEG tracks, where the son of Artiscape – Chicole (by Cam Fella) has rarely taken more than two weeks off. He has set a lifetime mark of 1:48.3 (at age five), and has banked $1,990,146 thus far for the Venture 2000 Stable of Mississauga, Ontario.
Come cheer him on towards his $2 million milestone, Saturday night, April 4, at Woodbine. Escape The Wind will take to the track in race #10, post time 10:39 p.m.
(WEG)
Not to take anything away
Not to take anything away from Roger Mayotte's success with Escape the Wind, but rather to keep the facts straight. Escape The Wind was another Murray Brethour student. He was a $23,000. US yearling purchase by Murray Brethour, who broke the horse in and started his racing career before selling him to Roger Mayotte at the beginning of his 3 year old year. Another great success story in this business.
Carolyn Rae
In reply to Not to take anything away by C. Rae
Actually Miss Rae, to keep
Actually Miss Rae, to keep the facts straight, Murray never started his racing career, he was unraced when he was purchased from Murray via Robert Young at Mohawk. If you check his lines, you'll see no one else has ever been listed as trainer of record other than Roger.
In reply to Actually Miss Rae, to keep by Rob MacKay
You are absolutely correct
You are absolutely correct Rob, and I apologize for the misunderstanding on your part, I never meant to imply that Murray raced the horse. Ironically, my husband commented right after I posted the comment, that someone would misunderstand what I had written, and assume I was stating that Murray had raced the colt, rather than "started his career" by giving him his early lessons, training down and schooling). But, since I had already hit the "Post Comment" button, it was too late for me to clarify at that point, and decided to wait and see. Thanks Rob, You have just proven him right!
To me, a young horse's career starts when the harness goes on for the first time, then to line driving, jogging, training, learning to race, schooling etc.(which Murray is able to do at his home farm with his own starting gate), not the first start on the track, and I was obviously not clear in my statement, poor wording. I was referring to the fact that Escape The Wind was another Murray Brethour pupil, (like so many before him), purchased for a modest price at Harrisburg as a yearling, broken in and trained down by Murray, before being sent to Bob Young on the "big track". This was supposed to be another "success story" in our industry from a modest beginning, and nothing more.
My point plain and simple was, you don't have to invest a large amount of money, or own a horse 100%, to have fun and make money in this industry. As you will no doubt agree, Murray has had a great deal of success with young horses, purchasing (for the most part at a modest price), breaking in, training down and racing or selling, and Escape The Wind was another prodigy of this very talented and successful colt trainer.
On the heels of the retirement of one of the greatest horses this sport has seen in many years, Somebeachsomewhere..., who gave this industry the biggest boost in positive media and fan following it has had since Cam Fella and Niatross, we need to keep as much positive media out there every chance we get, and hopefully get new people interested in our industry and in ownership (fractional or not). In these struggling times, the availability of fractional ownership becomes even more important to attract or even keep owners who might otherwise feel the pinch.
As with the mentoring program sponsored by the SBOA, which gives new owners chances at fractional ownership at a very modest investment, Joe Public needs to know fractional ownership at a modest investment, is becoming more and more an option in other stables also, as is the case with Murray Brethour and no doubt others.
I hope the message here will indicate to any who visit this site, that you don't have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to have fun and make money in this industry. Along with Escape The Wind, most recent success stories Ramegade Bruiser and of course SOMEBEACHSOMEWHERE spring to mind.
Carolyn Rae