The final leg of the NAADA Trotting Series was contested Thursday at Yonkers Raceway and when the dust had settled Paul Minore and Dr. John Kokinos each emerged victorious in their respective divisions and both were repeat winners in the series.
Minore and his old war horse, Wygant Prince, used the front-end route for a 1:59 victory and Kokinos used similar tactics to notch a 1:58.3 triumph behind Here Comes Numbers. . However both drivers needed the photo finish camera to verify the decisions.
In his contest Minore set sail from the three-hole with his 11-year old SJs Photo gelding and cut nearly equal fractions of :29.1; 1:00 and 1:29.4 before turning back his stubborn competition. Still with a solid one length lead as the field turned for home Minore was busy urging his charge as Bobby Ciarvardini and Balimor AS supplied constant pressure but when the photo-finish camera snapped Wygant Prince had notched his 36th career triumph which raised the trotter's lifetime earnings to almost $410,000. Fox Valley Steffen took home the show dough for Jennifer Lappe.
The winner is owned by Minore and trained by Taylor Gower.
Employing his usual strategy, Kokinos, who seems to like the front-end, sent the 10-year-old altered son of Here Comes Herbie to the lead and played catch me if you can... and nobody could, although his competitors made a race out of it as they headed for paydirt.
Still seemingly comfortable as the field heard for paydirt a hard charge by Master of Excuse and driver Monica Banca nearly made the outcome in question. But Here Comes Numbers gave Dr. John his fourth winning ride in the series as the veteran trotter tripped the camera for a neck triumph in 1:58.3. Lurking closely behind the leaders another neck farther back was third place finisher Soul Train and Joe Lee.
The winner is owned by Patrick Laiso and Jennifer Lappe and trained by Ms Lappe.
Slated next week is the consolation followed by the $15,000 series finale.
(NAADA)