Freshman fillies will take centre stage at Woodbine Racetrack on Friday night, as eliminations for the fabulous Fall Four stakes will be getting underway.
The first marquee race card of the winter season, scheduled for Saturday, October 25, features a quartet of stakes for two-year-olds, each worth in excess of $600,000: the $653,000 Goldsmith Maid for trotting fillies, the $660,000 Three Diamonds for pacing lasses, the $660,000 Valley Victory for trotting colts and geldings, and the $732,000 Governor's Cup for their pacing counterparts.
Three flights of fillies will go postward in the $23,000 eliminations for the Goldsmith Maid, and Bob McIntosh trainee Windsong Soprano has been gifted with the shortest odds of the 25, listed in the morning line at 6-5. The daughter of Windsongs Legacy snapped Raising Rachel's seven-race unbeaten streak in September, in the Peaceful Way Stakes at Mohawk, and has earned almost $350,000 for Lothlorien Stables of Cheltenham, ON.
Windsong Soprano will be up against Quebec import Tuscan Gal, who has resided in the shed row of conditioner Mark Steacy since July. The Andover Hall lass has a record of 2-0-1 in four tries thus far, with one of those victories coming in the $50,000 Peaceful Way consolation. She returned to Montreal on October 5 to capture the $72,000 Roger White Stakes, and is tapped as the 5-2 second choice in her elimination, carded as Race 2 (7:50 p.m.).
In the second of the three elims (Race 4, 8:30 p.m.) Dover Miss, a student of Ron Gurfein who grabbed the show spot in her last two starts at the Red Mile, has been installed as the 2-1 morning line favourite. Also sired by Andover Hall, Dover Miss has a record of 2-2-3 in nine starts. Frank Antonacci pupil Gift Card, who'll be making her Canadian debut, is the 5-2 second choice. The Credit Winner daughter has earned just shy of $86,000 for owners K R Breeding LLC of Somersville, CT, Jef Mar Acres of Vineland, NJ, and Gary Hoffman of Boynton Beach, FL.
John Kopas trainee Raising Rachel will be seeking redemption in the last of the three elims (Race 7, 9:30 p.m.). She had her first taste of defeat in the Peaceful Way Stakes, finishing a well-beaten fourth, but after a few weeks' rest she bounced back, to sail home 11 lengths to the good in her qualifier at Mohawk last Friday.
Bred by Cool Creek Farm of Mount Pleasant, Ontario, Raising Rachel is out of an Angus Hall half-sister to millionaire Casual Breeze. She's rated the 5-2 first choice, and has drawn the advantageous rail spot.
To view the entries for the Friday card, click here.
(WEG)