Can Winds Of Change change trainer/driver Dustin Jones’ luck? He’s hoping so.
Jones, who lost top filly Spirit To Win in a training mishap the week of the Hambletonian Oaks, is waiting to find out if Winds Of Change has sufficient 2015 earnings to get into the $200,000 Prix d’Été for four-year-old pacers on Sunday afternoon at Hippodrome 3R.
The son of American Ideal, owned by Bennett Wells Stable, finished third in a 1:50 mile at Mohawk last Saturday, pushing his earnings for the year past $48,000. He's few spots below a guaranteed berth in the field of eight, but could draw in if some of those ahead of him take a pass, as happened last year.
“If he gets in, we’re coming and I’ll drive him,” said Jones. “We’d truck down on Friday and go to my farm in Melbourne (Que.), I’d jog him there. He’d be the first horse on my track there since 2011.”
Jones hasn’t driven in a race in Quebec since he left his home province for Ontario in 2008. To make his return in the province’s richest race “would be fun,” he said.
(A Trot Insider Exclusive by Paul Delean)