A compact group of six faced the gate in Tuesday’s $121,800 OSS Gold Series at Mohawk Racetrack, and Levitation went a training trip for cash for the tandem of driver Doug McNair and trainer Tony Alagna.
McNair pointed Levitation to the early lead and the two-year-old son of Kadabra-Southwind Amiga strolled through facile fractions of :30, 1:00.2 and 1:30.4 before scooting home in :28 to win by a length over Winning American. Perfetto recovered from a backstretch miscue to finish a fast-closing third.
“He raced good. The fractions were on his side, but he did it pretty handily,” said McNair. “I think he’s going to keep getting better and better. He’s very green on the lead, still learning how to change gears.”
“When we shipped him up to race in the first Gold he’d missed a qualifier due to sickness so I didn’t think he was quite as physically ready as he was coming into this race,” noted Alagna. “I thought he would give a very good account of himself the first start at Georgian Downs, first lifetime start on the five-eighths mile track as well, but he came up short. We got him a little more fit, a little more healthy going into this race and I thought he raced super tonight.
“He was kind of a late to mature colt, he was very tall, but he didn’t really have a lot of muscle on him yet, and the more we trained him through the winter the stronger he got,” Alagna added. “Right before we left Florida you could really tell he was coming into himself and once we got him up north in Jersey he just really clicked and he’s been good ever since.”
The homebred youngster, who went through last year’s Lexington Select Yearling Sale for $90,000 has racked up $75,804 in purse earnings in his first two starts for co-owner/breeder David Anderson of Aurora, Ont. and Robert Leblanc of Austin, TX.
(Quotes from OSS)
To view results for Tuesday's card of harness racing, click the following link: Tuesday Results – Mohawk Racetrack.
For the official judges' report from Tuesday's card, click the following link: Judges' Report - Mohawk - August 1.