The second coming of Seabiscuit to Empire City is not to be...at least not this time around, anyway.
The standout Finnish trotter, who shares a name with the legendary American thoroughbred, had accepted an invitation to compete in Yonkers Raceway’s million-dollar International Trot, set for Saturday afternoon, Oct. 10.
However, according to race secretary Steve Starr, there were travel and personnel issues which concerned the trotter’s connections, eventually nixing his participation.
“The owners greatly appreciated our interest in their horse, but unfortunately, some of the concerns couldn’t be fixed to their satisfaction,” Starr said.
Early Monday evening, it was announced that Sweden’s Mosaique Face had accepted an invitation to participate in the International.
So, as of this writing, the magic number (of definite starters) is eight, with the race office planning to fill out the roster of 10 with two U.S. representatives in the next day or two.
The eight “in-to-gos”--alphabetically--include:
BBS Sugarlight (Norway)
Bee A Magician (Canada)
Mosaique Face (Sweden)
Oasis Bi (Italy)
On Track Piraten (Sweden)
Papagayo E (Norway)
Rod Stewart (Italy)
Timoko (France)
Again, please note the International (back after two decades) is part of a scheduled matinee card, with proposed first post (pending approval of the NYS Gaming Commission) at 2 p.m. and the race itself going at approximately 3:20 p.m.
(Yonkers Raceway)