There might have been a nation-wide system outage from Rogers Communications on Friday (July 8) but it was all systems go at Woodbine Mohawk Park as the oval hosted 10 two-year-old qualifiers under sunny skies.
American Starlight dazzled on Friday morning with the fastest qualifying time of the 10 dashes. Mike Whelan sat the two-year-old in the pocket behind pacesetter Watch Her Dewitt (Louis-Philippe Roy) through fractions of :30, :58.2 and 1:26.4 before pouncing late to get up for the 1:55.3 decision.
Walter Whelan trains American Starlight (American Ideal - Hayleighs Hat) for owner Christopher Nicol of Dundas, Ont.
On the trotting side of the ledger, Fox Valley Ontario made a splash in his provincial debut with a wire-to-wire win in 1:58.2. Mike Saftic guided the rookie trotter through panels of :29.2, :59 and 1:28.4 on top comfortably. A six-length win margin at the head of the lane widened to nearly nine at the wire, with Hamilton De Vie (Roy) some 8-3/4 lengths in arrears.
Randy Fulmer of Lasalle, Ont. trains and co-owns Fox Valley Ontario (Muscle Mass - Dont Think Twice) along with Phillip Katcher of Sun City Center, Fl.
The full video stream of Friday's session is available below.
For results from the qualifying session, click the following link: Friday Results - Woodbine Mohawk Park (Qualifiers).