Even a month’s worth of cobwebs couldn’t keep Cooper, the Cinderella Amish buggy horse, out of the winner’s circle at Northfield Park Wednesday night (Sept. 25).
Undefeated this year in his comeback season, but out of action since Aug. 21, the six-year-old gelding went wire-to-wire to prevail by a neck for driver Kurt Sugg. He was timed a mile in 1:57.2 and paid $2.40 as the heavily-bet 1-5 favourite.
The victory was Cooper’s eighth in a row. He earned $4,000 for his efforts, boosting his bankroll for 2019 to $28,700.
Cooper, a trotter, failed to win in six starts as a two-year-old in 2015 and left the racetrack to be a personal horse for an Amish family in Sugarcreek, Ohio. Earlier this year, when then owner Homer Stutzman realized Cooper was travelling down the roads of Tuscarawas County at a hectic clip, he turned him over to a friend, harness trainer Firman Troyer.
The conversion from pulling a buggy to pulling a sulky has resulted in a run of victories, all at Northfield, stretching from early June until late September (story here).
(Cleveland Plain Dealer)