Seven horses who won their first start in a qualifying race at Pocono Downs at Mohegan Pennsylvania last Tuesday morning were back in action this Tuesday, June 11 during 13 baby races. None of the winners drew against each other.
There were six male winners coming back, but none of them could repeat. The only two-time winner emerging was the Greenshoe-Tricky Sister trotting miss Shoestrings, who reduced her clocking from 2:04 first time out to 2:01.4 with a :29.1 final quarter for driver, trainer and owner D. R. Ackerman. She was also the only non-debutant/debutante to win on Tuesday except for the pacing colt division – more on those in a minute.
The other baby trotting filly winner went faster: Modesty Blaise (Chapter Seven-Diffident), who won in 2:01.1 by a nose over Dubraska Hanover for driver/trainer Åke Svanstedt and owner S R F Stable.
Svanstedt also won the two divisions for freshman trotting males, which were clocked in 1:59.3, fastest of the day in that grouping. One was another winner sired by Chapter Seven, the colt Read The Room (dam Debra Hall), finishing in :29.2 on the engine for Åke Svanstedt Inc., Little E LLC, B Nasstrom Holding Inc., and Nils Munkhaugen. The other was the Wishing Stone-I D Entity NO colt Magic Punk, who surmounted a first-over journey with back fractions of :58 and :28.4 for owner Rune Hansen.
Three of the six freshmen winning last week and returning Tuesday came from the trotting colt ranks, and three from the pacing colts. As noted, none repeated – but, interestingly, the four pacing colt sectors were all won by horses who did not win their first starts, but were the best on this Tuesday. Two of them were driven by Jason Bartlett; two of them were driven by trainer Todd Schadel.
The fastest baby seen yet at Pocono is the Huntsville-The Show Returns colt Fragment, who got to the lead past the quarter in :29.2, set the pace with middle splits of :58.4 and 1:27.3 en route to freezing the clock at 1:54.4 for trainer Per Engblom and the partnership of Douglas Sipple and Engblom Stable.
Bartlett also had the ride behind another son of Huntsville, the gelding Hunt Off The Press, who won for trainer Jared Bako in 1:55.1 with a :27.4 closing quarter.
The two winners in this group for Todd Schadel were the Tall Dark Stranger-Viva La Deo gelding Venom Hanover in 1:56.1 and the Always B Miki-Luvthebeachlife gelding Beach Legacy in 1:58.1.
Pocono’s leading driver Tyler Buter guided two winners in the pacing filly ranks including the fastest in the section, the Papi Rob Hanover-One Last Kiss miss Say Goodnight, who put in her own back fractions of :57.4 and :28.2 in a 1:58.4 win for trainer Nicholas Devita and owners David Hamm and Glenn Phillips. (Buter’s other pacing filly winner was the American Ideal-Azreal As It Gets baby Ideal Beauty Queen in 2:00.1.
Also recording a sub-2:00 in this group was the Deborah Daguet-trained Two Twenty Swift (Huntsville-Jag Out), quarter-moved by driver Jason Bartlett and triumphant in 1:59.1.
(With files from PHHA/Pocono)