The Bettors Delight mare Delishka N let favoured Turnthefrownaround go to the lead in front of the stands, stalked her, then came up the "Pocono Pike" to catch the chalk by a neck in 1:50.3 to take the $13,000 distaff pacing feature during the Sunday (July 4) card at The Downs at Mohegan Sun Pocono.
Turenthefrownaround went past Delishka N past the :27 quarter, then put up splits of :55 and 1:23 without great pressure. Through the stretch, it was apparent that a winning streak was going to two, and the streak, and the race, went to Delishka N, now a winner 31 times in 100 starts. Anthony Napolitano drove the Darren Taneyhill trainee, who now has earnings of $414,588, for D’Elegance Stable IX and Carmen Iannacone.
Aggiornamento, an altered freshman trotting son of Nuncio–Tuonela, made his career debut a memorable one with a 1:58.1 victory in an $11,700 contest for his age/sex/gait group. Tom Jackson kept him in the two-hole until headstretch and then trotted on comfortably in a :29.1 last quarter to win for driver Tom Jackson, trainer Fred Grant, and owner Russell Williams. (The horse who won the very next race on the card, Fashionwoodchooper, won his Pennsylvania Sire Stakes Championship in this same division here in 2017, paying $78.20.)
Aggiornamento’s contemporaries gather tomorrow afternoon at Pocono for the first stakes races for 2-year-olds this year: two $35,000 divisions of the Pennsylvania All-Stars series. Global Pandemic, a Cantab Hall–Nicoles Promise colt who debuted with a 1:56 win in a Tompkins-Geers event at The Meadowlands, heads one division; the horse who finished third behind Global Pandemic in the Jersey race, Keg Stand, is the favourite in the other cut.
(PHHA / Pocono)