Shark Week’s Triumphant Return: Stronger Than Ever?

Is it possible? Do you dare to imagine? Perchance, as Hamlet said, to dream?

Shark Week had his brilliant 17-race win streak broken on April 27 at Calgary’s Century Downs when the dazzling, unmatched, remarkable Standardbred was caught for the first time since May 6 of last year.

Now, after a 10-week layoff, he’s back and starting a new streak winning all of his last three starts by a total of more than 18 lengths.

So, again, is it possible Shark Week has returned better than ever?

“I think so,” said Shark Week’s driver Mike Hennessy.

“I think he’s getting better. He came home in 27 seconds flat this past Saturday and there still was lots left in the tank,” Hennessy said of the mile in 1:51.3 and winning by more than five lengths.

Twenty-seven seconds on a slow, dead racing surface.

By five easy lengths.

Incredible.

“He’s a freak of nature,” said Mike's dad, Rod, who trains and co-owns Shark Week.

The thing is Shark Week didn’t lose on April 27 because of a lack of effort. And certainly not because of anything that could be pinned on the horse. He lost because after the race it was discovered that Shark Week had an ulcer on his throat palate. He lost because of an injury.

“He didn’t feel right warming up,” said Mike. “I was worried.”

Shark Week started that losing race as usual: going to the top and snapping off a first quarter-mile in :26.1. Then he took them past a half 56.1 and three-quarters in 1:24.3. But when he was asked down the lane, he simply didn’t have his usual torrid closing kick. Bonus Round and Samba Beat both went by him with Shark Week only able to pace his final quarter mile in just 28.4. It was Shark Week’s slowest final quarter since Sept. 23 of last year.

“I knew something was wrong and I immediately had him scoped,” said Rod. “That’s when the ulcer showed up.

“He’s had an issue with ulcers most of his life,” said Rod. “But we’ve always been able to treat it. We changed medications. This time it didn’t work.”

Given two and a half months off, Shark Week returned on July 7 for a qualifying race. He won by 27 lengths in 1:51.2 with a last quarter in a gaping and numbing :26.2.

Repeat: a qualifier and he still goes in 1:51.2 pacing his last quarter in under 27 seconds.

Remarkable.

On July 13, he made his actual racing return and won by more than eight lengths in 1:51.3. He was a cat playing with a roll of yarn.

On July 20, he raced again in Calgary. He won that one by almost five lengths in 1:51.

And then came this past Saturday, he won by more than five lengths in that 1:51.3 mile.

“Lots of gas left in the tank,” said Mike. “I had tons left going through the wire. He was as strong at the finish as he was at any point in the race. He just doesn’t get tired and he’s got so much confidence. A 28-second quarter feels slow to him and me.”

Asked what it was like to drive Shark Week, Mike said in a post-race interview that, “It’s out of this world.

“I've driven a lot of really good horses that went on to other places and paced in [1]:48 or [1]:49 and they can't even light a candle to this horse. It's a totally different animal. It's like driving a sports car -- you can start him up, slow him down, start him up. Do whatever you want, he's going to do it for you”

Rod thinks this past Saturday’s race at Century Downs might have been his best ever.

“The track was probably easily two seconds off. It was like racing in the mud and we haven’t had any rain for three weeks. Taking that into consideration, I think that might just have been the best race he’s ever paced,” said Rod. “I think it was more like a 1:49 race.”

Shark Week knows all about 1:49 races. Last summer, he paced in 1:49.2. When the time was announced, the Calgary grandstand and the backstretch erupted with cheers. It was, after all, the fastest time ever in Western Canada and also made Shark Week the first Standardbred to go in under 1:50 in either Alberta or B.C.

He won by a stunning 8-3/4 lengths.

And he’ll probably go even faster.

How fast?

“Probably 1:48,” said Rod with no emotion in his voice. He said it as if you asked him if he would be cold in December in Alaska.

“It’s all natural ability. He is absolutely the most fluid, natural-gaited horse ever born. There is no wasted motion. He absolutely just loves to go fast. His attitude is to go faster and faster. His feet never seem to touch the ground. He just flies.

"Even jogging in the mornings he’s like that. So you just let him go because he’s going to go anyway.

“Mike told me driving him is like sitting in a rocking chair.”

Sometimes Shark Week will toy with the field. He will let somebody come up to him and just sit there for a while. Then he throws it into another gear.

Shark Week did exactly that this past January at Century Mile. Ernesto Delacruz and driver J.F. Gagne looked like they were going to sprint past Shark Week that day.

“For a second, I thought he was beat,” recalled Lorne Duffield, who owns Shark Week with Rod. “But then Shark Week said ‘No way’ and drew off again.

“He simply just wants to race and you don’t find that in many horses,” said Duffield, who has had horses with Rod for about 30 years.

At one time, Duffield owned about 30 horses. Now, he is down to a dozen. One year, Duffield bought 16 horses at the Alberta Yearling Sale.

“Shark Week is a smart horse. When he sees another horse coming he takes off again. It’s like being in fourth gear and shifting right to first gear,” continued Duffield. “Gone.”

The biggest question of all may be how good would he be against the world’s best horses in Ontario or anywhere else?

“I’d like to keep him here in Alberta. He’s become a fan favourite,” said Rod. “We may race him outside of Alberta in the fall. It really would be interesting to see how he would do. I think he’d be fine but… I really don’t know.”

Duffield doesn’t know either. But he does know this: “I believe he is as good as any horse in Canada. He’d be competitive at Woodbine or anywhere else.

“Every sport needs a hero,” said Duffield, who started out with six Boston Pizza franchises and now is down to two. “People in Alberta like to come out to see him win. We’ve got to promote that. I’d race him for nothing if I didn’t have any bills to pay.”

Shark Week’s point of reference is As Promised, who won a mesmerizing 71 of 104 starts from 1992 to 1996 and took a mark of 1:50.2 at The Meadowlands. As Promised won 18 in a row during one stretch for Alberta driver/trainer Keith Clark. Then he won 17 straight in another monumental span of time.

“Alberta has seen a lot of good horses but none that dominated like As Promised,” said Rod of the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame pacer.

“Just to be mentioned in the same sentence as As Promised says a lot; it’s quite the compliment,” said Rod, who deservedly was named Alberta’s Horseperson of the Year in 2023. It was the fifth time he has won that award.

“It’s hard to judge different generations. Like who was better, Wayne Gretzky or Connor McDavid? Who was better? Who is to tell?”

In 2016, Rod, whose father, Owen, trained a small stable in the 1960s, was given the Ron McLeod Award of Achievement for his lifetime of contribution to Standardbred racing in Alberta.

All accomplishments are well deserved for Rod, who has been training and driving since he was 16.

Just four years later Owen died.

“I ended up with a stable of horses and most were no good,” said Rod. “But I’ve been lucky along the way. I’ve always had a couple good owners with me.”

In his career Rod, who just turned 70, has won 2,831 races as a driver and 2,246 races as a trainer.

That’s not luck.

“I don’t feel like I’m 70. But some days I feel like I’m 90.”

Hip No. 26 and consigned by breeder Meridian Farms, Shark Week is a son of popular Vertical Horizon, who won in 1:49.3. Shark Week was purchased by Duffield and Rod Hennessy for just $6,000 at the 2019 Alberta Yearling Sale.

“I’m sure a lot of other horsepeople are still kicking themselves,” said Rod with another typical grin.

“I liked Shark Week before I even saw him at the sale. His grand dam is Shark Fest. She raced for Keith Clark and Gigi Van Ostrand and was a really nice mare,” Rod said of the mare who won 10 of 30 starts and was second five times and third four times.

“There’s no secret to buying good horses,” said Rod, laughing. “You just have to get lucky. You don’t have to be smarter than everyone else. You just have to be luckier.”

Because of who he is, Shark Week, now six years old and who has gotten better with age, gets what he wants.

“He’s spoiled rotten,” said Rod.

A scrounger, Rod said Shark Week likes to have four feed tubs in is stall at the same time. One tub will be filled with alfalfa cubes. Another tub has a special feed for his ulcers. A third contains oats and a fourth has mixed feed. On top of that, he has a hay bag, which he nibbles on.

Shark Week goes from one tub to another. “He eats all day but just a little bit at a time.”

And then there are bananas.

“He loves them,” said Rod. “And they are good for horses.”

A typical day for Shark Week includes a mid-morning nap.

“He just lays down and goes to sleep.”

But put a bridle on him and hook him to a race bike and there’s no dozing off.

“When it’s race day he’s all business,” said Rod.

“We all have had a lot of fun with this horse. Everyone has. Except for the the guys chasing him.”

“It’s been a great ride,” said Duffield.

And it’s far from over.

(Curtis Stock / thehorses.com)