Anyone who enjoys watching harness racing will be in heaven this weekend. The Meadowlands is hosting the always outstanding Hambletonian Day tomorrow while two Ontario racetracks, Hanover and Grand River, will showcase their signature races with talent laden cards over the following two days.
Hanover’s Dream Of Glory Trot headlines their Sunday evening program while Grand River’s holiday Monday card includes the Battle of Waterloo and its filly companion race, the Battle of the Belles. Both programs are a tremendous showcase for Ontario-sired colts and fillies and each will feature the OSS’s glamour boy division, the three-year-old pacing colts.
Hanover’s card, which gets underway at 6:30 p.m. on Sunday, has five $18,000 OSS Grassroots divisions in races one, two, three, six and eight while Grand River’s card on Monday includes a trio of $70,000 OSS Gold events for the sophomore pacing colts.
A local colt to keep an eye on in the second division at Hanover, race two, is Vero Hanover, making his OSS debut. Unraced last year at two, the Shadow Play gelding has won his last two outings at Hanover for local owners Cat Sass Stable, Michael and Phyllis McClennan of Listowel, Ont. Bruce Gilkinson handles the training duties and Hanover’s leading driver, Bruce Richardson, who has guided Vero Hanover in his last three races at Hanover, will again be in the bike.
Richardson's mount in the $75,000 Dream Of Glory final (for three-year-old Ontario-sired trotters) is Tothepointe James for trainer Wayne Henry, who has an entry in the race. Henry will guide Warrawee Promesse, a winner in his elimination last week while Richardson takes his stablemate who finished second.
The following day finds Grand River Raceway rolling out the red carpet for their biggest day of the year, Industry Day, which is highlighted by the two Battle races for rookie Ontario-bred pacers, and this year the OSS three-year-old colt pacers in Gold action.
Two Hall of Fame horsemen on both sides of the border and longtime friends, Bob McIntosh and John Campbell, will attempt to capture the $217,000 Battle of Waterloo final with Go Daddy Go. This is Campbell’s first appearance in the Waterloo final, one of the rare stakes races he hasn’t captured.
“Bob McIntosh called me about Go Daddy Go. I raced him in a Sires Stakes at Mohawk and he raced very well. He wanted to know if I would come up and try him in [the Battle of Waterloo] and I said, ‘Sure.’ We’re not that busy through the week in New Jersey and he’s a nice colt,” Campbell noted earlier this week.
Campbell, the richest harness driver of all time, rarely drives in the OSS. His drive on Go Daddy Go in the OSS at Mohawk in early July was his only OSS steer to date this year, but he’ll add another one on Monday.
McIntosh also listed Campbell to drive his three-year-old colt Regal Son in the second Gold division. The Stonebridge Regal colt earns the jump up to the Gold division after a pair of Grassroots scores.
Grand River’s matinee card begins at 1:30 p.m. on Monday with the Gold divisions as races two, six and eight.
(OSS)