Guy Gagnon picked up a training triple on the card of harness racing at Rideau Carleton Raceway on Thursday, Sept. 19, starting with a win, ending with a win, while adding the feature to round out the hat trick.
The track's second leading trainer this year, Gagnon handed the lines over to the track's top reinsmen — Guy Gagnon — for the driving three-bagger.
Thursday started with Gagnon guiding Conquest Seelster ($5.40) to victory in wire-to-wire fashion, winning in 1:54.1. Thursday ended with Gagnon guiding beach Journey ($6.50) to victory in wire-to-wire fashion in 1:55.2.
The win in the middle — with All Wrapped Up ($4.20) in the $10,000 Preferred Trot — didn't feature on-the-engine tactics.
A field of six horses went postward in the top class trotting event, with post five starter Black Tie Bash and driver Robert Shepherd getting slight favouritism over the outer most starter, All Wrapped Up and Gagnon.
The Great Emotion (Pascal Berube) tried to make every call a winning one, and was successful through 75 per cent of the fractions. The Great Emotion fronted the field through panels of :28, :57 and 1:25.3, while Duke Lavictoire (Jacques Beaudoin) stalked first over and towed second-over All Wrapped into contention. Gagnon flipped the three-wide switch with All Wrapped Up around the five-eighths mark, looped the first-up challenger and made it to the leader's bridle heading around the far turn. Once that front duo hit the stretch, All Wrapped Up put away the early leader. He then had to fend off the late brush from Black Tie Bash, and did so by a neck in 1:55.1. Ripped And Ready (Jimmy Gagnon) rounded out the top trio.
Eight-year-old All Wrapped Up (Archangel - Jukebox Jackie) is owned by Sylvain Cote of Joliette, Que. and Michel Lagace of Terrebonne, Que., who claimed him earlier this month at Woodbine Mohawk Park. He's now a 33-time winner in his career with $617,158 in earnings.
After Thursday's haul, Gagnon lifted his career training stats to 1,883 victories and more than $10.1 million in purse earnings.
For the results from Thursday's card of harness racing in the nation's capital, click the following link: Thursday Results - Rideau Carleton Raceway.
(Standardbred Canada)