What started out as a 'mundane' Yonkers Raceway Saturday night wound up lending itself to any number of stories and sidebars.
Let’s run down the plotlines, shall we...
The Features—A pair of sixes, in Great Vintage (Dan Dube, $6.10) in 1:51.2, and Luminosity (George Brennan, $6.70) in a life-best 1:53.3, won the evening’s $48,000 co-features for Open pacers and trotters, respectively.
The Record-Sharer—Forty Five Red (Mark MacDonald, $4.60) held sway in the $35,000 Open Handicap Pace for four-year-olds, and he did so in 1:50.1. That effort matched Crombie A’s three-week-old, all-age track record, while setting a new one for Forty Five Red’s age group. The time also matched the son of If I Can Dream’s own life-best performance.
The Record-Sharer, Part II—Luminosity’s previously-proclaimed 1:53.3 trotting work night equalled that of Meladys Monet for season’s fastest locally (set four weeks ago).
The Speed—Ten of the evening’s dozen races were essentially won wire-to-wire, or at least by the horse who was moving to the lead at the quarter. The other two races were won by one out of the pocket and one sitting a three-hole. The “slowest” of the 10 pacing events went in 1:52.3, while the non-Luminosity trot “trudged home” in 1:55.2.
The Humans—Dube won four races, Brennan three.
The Raceway’s live season continues Monday night (first post 7:10 p.m.), featuring the $150,224 New York Sire Stakes Lew Barasch Trot (two-year-old colts/geldings).
(With files from Yonkers Raceway)