The absence of five of the top 10 point earners has left the door ajar in Wednesday’s three-year-old trotting filly Gold Eliminations at Flamboro Downs
, and trainer Bob Young is hoping Condi Lane is ready to sneak through into next week’s Gold Final and maybe even the season ending Super Final.
“They have to finish one, two to get in to the (Gold) Final,” acknowledges the Guelph resident. “Touch wood, she should be good in there.”
After logging three wins and four seconds through her first eight starts, including a runner-up effort in her Gold Series debut at Georgian Downs on June 21, a win in the Bud Lite Stakes at Flamboro Downs on July 4, and a runner-up finish in the July 18 Canadian Breeders Championship Eliminations at Mohawk Racetrack, Condi Lane ran into a rough patch peppered with breaks and lackluster performances.
She laboured to finish in the Canadian Breeders Championship Final, made a break in her Aug. 2 Gold Elimination at Mohawk, and then balked at the starting gate in the Sept. 4 Simcoe Stakes at the Campbellville oval.
“She had seven, eight or nine very good starts, and then the wheels sort of fell off,” admits Young. “She had the lead turning for home in the Canadian Breeders Final and she was horrible. All she had to do was trot home in 29 seconds and she would have been good that night.”
After her miscue in the Gold Elimination, Young gave the Striking Sahbra daughter a month off and turned a microscope on her health. He felt the addition of Lasix to her routine was warranted, but her distaste for the starting gate in the Simcoe sent him back to square one.
“She wouldn’t even go near the gate. She was all together horrible,” recalls the horseman, who conditions Condi Lane for Robert Deveau of Toronto. “So we went back to the drawing board, made a few more changes and qualified her this morning (Friday).”
Over a rain-soaked Mohawk oval rated two seconds slower than normal, Condi Lane and regular reinsman Dave Boughton cruised to the front heading by the half, and were all alone on the front-end at the wire, halting the teletimer at 2:01.3. Young was satisfied with the effort, noting that the footing was particularly poor along the rail.
“They allowed two seconds, but they probably could have allowed four,” he explains. “Dave moved her down the backstretch and just sat her out three-wide. The footing was better out there.
“I think we’ve got her figured out now,” he adds. “Her feet were bothering her, and we were working on her feet, but I guess we weren’t doing enough.”
Boughton will steer Condi Lane from Post 4 in the second of four $40,000 Gold Eliminations on Wednesday, aiming for a top two finish to grab a spot in the Sept. 24 Gold Final. Among the fillies they will face in the seven-horse field is recent Trillium Series winner Torch, who makes her second appearance on the 2008 Gold Series circuit from Post 5.
With the 25 points she earned finishing second in her Gold Elimination at Georgian Downs, Condi Lane is just 25 points, or another second-place finish, shy of the current cut off for one of 10 hotly contested spots in the Nov. 15 Super Final. The top four point earners and the number seven ranked filly will not make the trip to Flamboro Downs on Wednesday, giving Condi Lane and the other competitors nipping at their heels added incentive to come up with a big effort over the Dundas oval.
Post time for the Wednesday, Sept. 17 program is 6 p.m., and the three-year-old trotting fillies will be geared up for battle in Races 2, 3, 5, and 6.
To view Wednesday’s entries, click here.
(OSS)