After campaigning the top trotters in the Atlantic Sires Stakes program last year, trainer Clare MacDonald will be hoping to pick up where she left off as the season gets underway for the diagonally-gaited youngsters this evening (Tuesday, July 12) at Red Shores at Summerside Raceway.
Some of the most notable young Atlantic-sired trotters will be in action with two-year-olds competing in a $17,360 division and the three-year-olds split into a pair of $9,800 divisions.
However, the most anticipated season debut will be for the 2021 Atlantic Breeders Crown two-year-old trot champion, Up Helly AA, who has drawn the number three post position in the eighth race of the card. Conditioned by MacDonald and owned by Riley Farms of Summerside, the Armbro Barrister-Burnt With Finesse colt had a nearly perfect 2021 campaign, with his first start being a close third-place finish followed by nine consecutive wins in rein MacDonald’s husband Ken. He was named Horse of the Year by the P.E.I. Standardbred Horse Owners Association.
The Antigonish, N.S. horsewoman was pleasantly surprised by her trainee’s achievements last year.
“When you start the season out, you don’t always know what you have compared to everyone else,” MacDonald told Trot Insider. “Since we train at home at the farm, we don’t get to see the competition until we get to stakes night.”
Up Helly AA has earned $43,139 in just one year of racing and has the current lifetime mark of 2:01.1, which the connections will be certainly eyeing to outdo in his sophomore year.
“He looks tremendous,” said MacDonald. “He’s grown and filled out. He’s a real handsome horse. He started back up training in February and has continued to grow.”
MacDonald has noticed a fair amount of physical improvement from the now three-year-old trotter and hopes everything else has followed along.
“He has gotten bigger and stronger. I just hope he is as mentally focused as he was last year. He can be a high-strung horse but when he swings behind the gate, he is usually all business.”
Currently sitting at 5-2 odds on the morning line, Up Helly AA is most likely to go off as the betting favourite Tuesday night as he’ll look to make it 10 straight wins but keeping the streak alive is not one of MacDonald’s main concerns.
“We have to take it one race at a time,” she said. “If we get too hung up on the streaks, it can be too much pressure. We just want to keep the horses healthy and hope the racing gods are kind to us.”
Not only has this colt had a hot fiery start to his racing career but he also had an almost fatal fire-related experience, which provides and explanation for his unique name. MacDonald was not a fan of the name when the colt was purchased for $20,000 as a yearling from the Atlantic Classic Yearling Sale but it was not long before she changed her mind.
“When the horse was first purchased, I wanted to change the name because I thought the name had something to do with A.A. or something. But when I spoke to the woman who conditioned him for the sale, she begged me not to.”
At the time when the dam, Burnt With Finesse, was carrying the young foal, the barn she was stabled in caught on fire. Luckily, the dam and unborn foal were alright, but it left a unique opportunity to name the horse after something related to fire. Up Helly Aa is an annual fire festival held in Shetland, Scotland where the attendees march through the streets with fire-lite torches and at the end of the procession set Viking longboats on fire. With the almost horrific fire-related accident along with the dam’s name, Up Helly AA turned into a good fit of a name and MacDonald let the name remain.
MacDonald has another three-year-old trotter entered in the other division Tuesday evening named Cadillac. In nine starts last year, Cadillac earned $16,386 and only won once, taking an Atlantic Sires Stakes division at Charlottetown Driving Park in the time of 2:04.3. Although this son of Tad The Stud-Credibility has not seen the same success as his stablemate Up Helly AA, MacDonald feels he has a similar skill set while training.
“He has the credentials to be a top trotter himself but [for] whatever reason, he wanted to stop trotting,” said MacDonald, who shares ownership of Cadillac with Wayne Burley of Truro, N.S. “I’m hoping those foolish breaks are behind him as he’s matured over the last couple of months of training. When we trained last year, he would fight for the top and whoever got to the front first would rule the roost but when we got to the track, he seemed to do everything to avoid the winner’s circle.”
MacDonald herself is set to drive Cadillac in the fifth race of the card.
MacDonald swept the 2021 Atlantic Breeders Crown trots with Up Helly AA and Mr Finlay Ridge in the three-year-old division, and although she no longer has Mr Finlay Ridge in her barn, she does have his half-sister, Miss Brylee Ridge (Tad The Stud-R Rocket Rachel).
The filly will be making her career debut in the ATSS two-year-old division set to open the program and will be looking to duplicate a similar success.
“This would be the [sixth] foal from the broodmare, and most were big horses but she’s just a little halfling,” said MacDonald. “She will have to take more steps than her siblings did, but she did seem pretty good qualifying.”
Although there is a difference in size between Miss Brylee Ridge and her siblings, she does share a similar skill set as the others possessed.
“She is really well gaited like her siblings and the fact that she’s almost half their size makes it that much more impressive.”
MacDonald will drive the filly, who she co-owns with Ian Tate of St. Andrews, N.S. along with Marcus MacInnis and Arnold Rankin of Antigonish, N.S.
Summerside Raceway will host 10 dashes Tuesday evening and it all begins at 6:30 p.m. local Atlantic time.
To view Tuesday’s harness racing entries, click on the following link: Tuesday Entries – Summerside Raceway.
(A Trot Insider exclusive by Trey Colbeck)