After delighting the fans on Thursday at the Delaware County Fairgrounds, the richest Standardbred in the history of the sport, the $7.63 million winner Foiled Again will be racing on Friday night (September 21) at Batavia Downs, which is the next stop of his farewell tour as he heads to retirement at the end of the year.
Foiled Again’s lifetime win count is now at 103 races and he comes to Batavia on a three-race win streak having won at the Greenville Fair, the Windsor Fair and most recently at Freehold Raceway.
This past week he made an appearance at the Little Brown Jug in Delaware, Ohio and went a training mile in front of the crowd on Jugette Day in preparation for his race at Batavia.
The 14-year-old Foiled Again will compete in race eight at Batavia which is an Open II event going for $10,000 and the estimated post time for that race is 9 p.m. The visit was made possible through his owners Burke Racing, the Weaver Bruscemi partnership, and JJK Stables.
Having raced at Batavia Downs six times in his career, Foiled Again has a solid 5-1-0 record. His first appearance was in 2009 when he captured his first of three wins in Batavia's signature stakes event, the Robert J. Kane Memorial Pace. He also won two Opens and finished second in a third.
In an interview earlier this summer, trainer Ron Burke expressed his feelings about racing Foiled Again at Batavia Downs.
"Of course Foiled will be coming to Batavia this year; Batavia is always on his list. One of the best memories we ever had of his career was his win in the 2016 Kane Memorial there. We were all at the Lexington sale watching the race on a monitor outside. We knew that was probably going to be his last stake ever. And when he came flying from the back of the pack after they kept him parked out the whole mile to swoop the field and win, we were all screaming and cheering. We were literally all crying, it was special for us."
Jim Morrill Jr. will be in the bike behind the pacing legend this week to see if he can make his last visit at Batavia a winning one.
Foiled Again is just part of one of the biggest nights of harness racing ever held at Batavia Downs.
The New York Sire Stakes (NYSS) consolation races will also be held with eight divisions going to post for the $320,000 in purse money available.
The first NYSS race is non-betting with a 5:20 p.m. post time. Then NYSS events are in race one, two, three, five, six seven and 10. Post time for the first betting race is 6:00 p.m.
The early Pick-5 wager (which runs from race one through race five) includes four of the NYSS consolation events and has a guaranteed pool of $3,000 for Friday. It is part of the USTA Strategic Wagering pool. The Batavia Downs early Pick-5 on Friday is also the USTA Play of the Day on the Harness Racing Fan Zone.
(with files from Batavia)