Trot Insider has learned that top Alberta pacing mare Senga Nightmare has passed away at the age of eight years old. The multiple stakes winner was humanely euthanized following an injury in her last race on Friday, May 8 at Century Downs.
A longtime prized pupil in the Ryan Grundy stable, Senga Nightmare hit the board in 50 per cent of her 172 career races, winning 42 times and earning $311,717 in purses. Grundy owned the mare bred by Ken Gunn and drove her in every single one of her starts.
Senga Nightmare was a California Sire Stakes champion, easily sweeping the five-leg series for four-year-old mares at Cal Expo in 2022, and a six-time winner while facing Alberta's best distaffers in the Open/Preferred ranks. In 2023, she posted the season's co-fastest mile by a female pacer in her home province with her 1:51.4 career-best effort, which was a Track On 2 divisional track record at the time.
The Vertical Horizon-Nells Sweet Future mare proved to be a nightmare for her competition with her reliable late closing kick that yielded memorable victories and big upsets in the majority of her local wins, including three thrilling double-digit scores in the Preferred ranks this year.
Please join Standardbred Canada in offering condolences to the connections of Senga Nightmare.
(Standardbred Canada)
The final Senga...
Senga Nightmare would be the final horse to race - bearing the Senga name that would date back to over 50 years in harness racing. Long time breeder, the late Dr. Brad Gunn of Alberta, used his wife's name Agnes - spelled backwards. Sorry for your loss Ryan.
"Dr. Brad Gunn was more responsible than any other man for putting Western Canada back on the harness racing map." - Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame inductee of 1981