In the face of recent personal and professional adversity, horseman Roger Mayotte is finding success with a tandem of three-year-old trotting fillies and the sky remains the limit for them both.
After a few breaks in her two-year-old season, Princesspartypants is putting it together at three. In her second start of the summer, the daughter of Muscle Mass posted a 1:54.4 victory in a $73,067 Ontario Sires Stakes Gold event at Woodbine Mohawk Park (a replay of the race appears below).
"'Princess' is pretty much the professional racehorse and has been from Day One — easy to break in, nicely [gaited] and trained well all that first winter," Mayotte said in a recent feature that appeared in the Hamilton Spectator.
“She showed me enough last year that she should improve at three, and after these two starts she has," Mayotte continued. "I no longer wear trotting hopples on her because she seems very sure footed, but I do wear a shadow roll because she can see things that scare her. She is a little goofy that way, but I’m impressed with her ability and look for good things.”
Princesspartypants' stablemate, Modern Mass, may have a bit longer of a path to success, but Mayotte sees plenty of potential in her just the same.
"Actually, she started to pick it up at the end of last year," he said. "She is a larger filly with a perfect gait, but can lose interest and even pull up halfway through the race. But that was not the case the other night when she trotted home in 55 seconds — that impressed me."
In her Gold event, Modern Mass closed strongly to take third behind Warrawee Vicky (a replay of the race appears below). Ten days prior, she broke maiden powerfully in 1:55.4 at Mohawk.
"I think there is little to separate the two.”
Given both fillies' ability to finish strongly in their toughest tests of the season to date, things look to be on the upswing for the Mayotte stable. The next OSS test for Mayotte's three-year-old trotting fillies comes on July 26 at Rideau Carleton Raceway.
(With files from the Hamilton Spectator)