Eau Naturelle and trainer-driver Simon Delisle picked a perfect spot to be the 22-1 upset winner, nipping overwhelming favourite Y S Suzanne by a nose in the second round of the Québec-Bred Series for four- and five-year-old trotters at Hippodrome 3R Tuesday evening (June 26).
The third race for mares started off with Y S Suzanne and driver Guy Gagnon going right to the early lead with Eau Naturelle and Delisle sitting right on their backs.
Y S Suzanne cut fractions of :30, 1:00.3 and 1:30. It was at the three-quarter marker that Delisle moved to the outside and gathered momentum with Eau Naturelle and the mare responded, gaining on the leader around the final turn.
As they started down the stretch, Eau Naturelle kept gaining slowly on the Y S Suzanne and caught her at the wire by a nose in 2:00.1. Lucky Promesses (Jerome Lombart) was third.
It was a lifetime mark for Eau Naturelle, a five-year-old daughter of Windsong Espoir who is co-owned by Chantal Auger, Raymond Bouffard, Rejean Page and Anne Delisle of Québec. Eau Naturelle paid $46.60 to win.
In the fifth race, the horse division of the Québec-Bred Series, the race was pretty much over after the start as Kinnder Dangerous and driver Justin Filion led from start to finish in a lifetime mark of 1:58.1.
With KFB Amigo Cool and driver Stephane Brosseau following them in second place, Kinnder Dangerous cut fractions of :28.2 and :59.1 to the half before race favorite Capteur De Reve and driver Pierre Luc Roy were able to flush Holiday Party (Pascal Berube) first-over and they started to go after Kinnder Dangerous.
But that plan did not work out as Holiday Party could not advance, forcing Capteur De Reve to go three-wide. After the three-quarters in 1:28.3, Brosseau came after Filion with KFB Amigo Cool, but they could not gain any ground as Kinnder Dangerous was the strong horse down the stretch, winning by 2-3/4 lengths. KFB Amigo Cool was second with Capteur De Reve third.
It was the second win in four starts this year for Kinnder Dangerous. The four-year-old gelding by Northern Escort was bred by owner-trainer Denitza Petrova of Melbourne. He paid $5.70 to win.
On the evening, excluding the first race which was a disqualification, the next six races all saw winning horses register lifetime marks.
Both Stephane Brosseau and Guy Gagnon had driving doubles while Alain Martin led all trainers with two wins from his stable.
Live race resumes on Sunday (July 1) at H3R with first race post time at 12:50 p.m.
For more information, visit www.quebecjockeyclub.com.
To view Tuesday's harness racing results, click the following link: Tuesday Results - Hippodrome 3R.
(Québec Jockey Club)