It’s not often that a maiden starter wins its first start on a half mile track, especially from post 8, but Archimed Alpha got the job done Friday at Hippodrome 3R and paid his backers impressively at odds of 42-1.
The fifth race trot saw Erge Magic Bab and driver Stephane Brosseau go to the early lead with Style of Elegance (Jean-Paul Rousse) grabbing the two-hole spot as those two sped away from the field to the opening quarter mile.
Meanwhile, driver Pascal Berube had left from the outside with Archimed Alpha and despite being parked out, was able to continue towards the leaders and drop into third place.
As they came into the backstretch, Berube came first-over with a determined Archimed Alpha and was gaining ground on the leaders by the three-quarters. Also, the race favourite, 1/9 Emotions Riches (Stephane Gendron) had caught the field and was closing in behind Archimed Alpha.
Coming down the stretch Archimed Alpha was the strong horse, passing by Erge Magic Bab and then holding off Emotions Riches to win by three-quarters of a length in 2:03. Erge Magic Bab was third.
It was lifetime mark for Archimed Alpha in his very first pari-mutuel start. The three-year-old colt by Royalty For Life is trained by Sylvain Tremblay for the Alpha Stable of Metabetchouan who also bred the colt.
For Archimed Alpha, he paid $86.50 to win, the highest win payoff of the new race meet at H3R.
In the seventh race Preferred Handicap Pace, Samuel Fillion and race favourite Dreydl Hanover traded the early lead with Littlebitaswagger (Stephane Brosseau) to a :26.4 speedy opening quarter mile and was then content to sit a pocket trip while Maracasso (Stephane Gendron) came first-over and pressured Littlebitaswagger for the last half mile of the race. In the stretch, Fillion found room as Maracasso tired and came on to beat Littlebitaswagger by a half length in 1:55.4, the fastest mile of the afternoon card. Somewhere Bettor (Pascal Berube) was third.
It was the second win this year for Dreydl Hanover. The 11-year-old gelded son of Cams Card Shark is trained by Francis Richard for owner Francois Morin of Beauceville and paid $5.20 to win.
Both Pascal Berube and Stephane Gendron has driving doubles as did trainer Sylvain Tremblay.
Louis-Philippe Roy will be back driving at 3R on Sunday. He is listed to drive in all 10 races on the program that begins at 12:30 p.m.
The Quebec Jockey Club announced that is will hold two special Saturday afternoon race cards on June 12 and June 19. These two dates will be devoted to the track hosting the Quebec Regional Fair Circuit. Those two weeks there will not be racing on Fridays.
(Quebec Jockey Club)