For the second straight week, the Pennsylvania Fair harness circuit set up shop at the Lycoming County Fairgrounds in the northcentral portion of the state; Hughesville hosted one of five “two-day” non-fair events enabled by legislation last week and the Fair Sire Stakes horses raced the “fair-proper” meeting this Wednesday and Thursday.
The most amazing fact from this week’s racing occurred on Thursday, the day for three-year-olds, as brothers Todd and Tony Schadel swept the eight “A” Fair Sire Stakes events, two divisions each in each of the four categories. Tony is the driver for the barn trained by his wife Linda and the pair co-own all of their three-year-old winners, while Todd is the trainer and driver of the winners from his shedrow.
Tony and Linda Schadel had a sweep of the pacing filly event, including the Always B Miki filly Milagro, the horse who first won her 2024 championship in a record time and then last Thursday set the Hughesville’s standard of 1:55.2 under perfect conditions before coming back again this Thursday to win in 1:59 over the "good" track conditions. Her stablemate, Tinas Wish, also won in 2:01.3. In the three other sophomore “A” sections, drivers Todd won one and Tony won one.
The “A” colt paces both provided 2:00 miles, the faster from the Always B Miki gelding Dont B Blue in 1:59.1 for Tony and Linda. Todd won in 2:00 with Bettor Not to become one of two horses, both from his barn, to win in the “A” events at the first three fair stops. A third 2:00 mile was added in a “B” Sire Stakes cut, as Risky Endeavor won in 2:00 for driver Joe Chindano Sr. and trainer Neil Balcerak.
On the trot, 2024 champion Lionheart Hanover, a Greenshoe gelding, won in 2:01 with Tony’s handling for the fastest trot of this meet; the other winner in this group, Set The Bar in 2:05, set the track trot standard of 1:58.4 last week and was the second horse of Todd’s to reach three “A” wins at the fairs in 2025. It should be noted that among Todd’s sophomore winners, Set The Bar is the only one not exclusively owned by Todd and his wife Christine; Rick and Regina Beinhauer are also partners.
Among the two-year-olds in Wednesday's action, no “A” horse recorded a third win, but the fair season’s record listing was beaten once and tied once, both alterations by fillies. The Father Patrick trotting filly Pixies Stardust broke her maiden in a fair-leading 2:04.1 for trainer/driver Steve Schoeffel and owners Kathy Schoeffel, James Nelson, Michael Munn and Roger Romesser.
On the pace, the 2:03.1 season’s mark of Beachys Mistress (also handled by Schoeffel) was equalled by the Heston Blue Chip miss Lady T, who broke her maiden for trainer/driver Pete Kaiser, co-owner with Zachary Kaiser.
Top training honours at Hughesville II were shared by Linda and Todd Schadel with seven winners; Tony Schadel won the driving crown by guiding all seven of Linda’s winners, with Todd driving six horses he trained (the seventh winner was guided by his son Cody, finishing ahead of his dad). Eric Neal continued with a hot hand by steering two winners each day.
The fair circuit is right back in action starting this weekend at Clearfield, about as central a track as there is in Pennsylvania, with Clearfield employing their now-unique, four-day format: freshman trotters are featured on Saturday, July 12 at 5:30 p.m., followed by their pacing counterparts on Sunday, July 13 at 1 p.m. Sophomores are highlighted the last two days at Clearfield, with trotters at 1 p.m. on Monday, July 14 and the meet-closing with pacers at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, July 15.
All the Clearfield action is scheduled for live streaming on the YouTube channel of the Fair Horsemen’s Association.
(Meadows Standardbred Owners Association, Pennsylvania Harness Horsemen’s Association & Pennsylvania Fair Harness Horsemen’s Association)