Last lap with rah-rah Hervé

By: Debbie Little

He’s been the best and he’s beaten the best.

Hervé Filion is the winningest driver in harness racing history with over 15,000 victories to his name. He’s a Hall of Famer who was given the Order of Canada for his significant successes, a champion who’s known as much for his showmanship as his skill. With nothing left to prove, Filion plans to hang up his reins on February 1, 2010 -- his 70th birthday. Now, with a North American retirement tour in the works, just one thing mars his otherwise perfect record.

The only memory, or the clearest, that some may have of harness racing’s Babe Ruth is of an alleged race fixing scandal in New York; the accusations brought forth against Filion stemmed from a 1995 wired-tapped phone conversation.

“To a layman,” says Stan Bergstein, executive vice-president of Harness Tracks of America, “Hervé’s conversations about racing could have been misconstrued. He was always an optimist, always thought he had a chance. ‘You can’t win if you’re not in’ was one of his favourite sayings. And he ­wasn’t too far wrong, having won over 15,000 races.”

Filion was never convicted of the crime. He pled guilty instead on a charge of failing to file a tax return (at the direction of his lawyers), which carried a penalty of $90. His name was cleared; he was proven innocent. But for some, it seems, there has been lingering doubts since the allegations were made.

In 2001, the New York State Racing and Wagering Board refused to grant him a license, stating that “his character and general fitness were not in the best interests of racing” and “as a licensee he was obligated to follow the rules of racing in New York and he failed to do that.”

Thankfully for Filion, their feelings were not shared by Pennsylvania, the first of three states in which he applied for and was granted a license to drive (Delaware and Ohio followed shortly after).

“I reviewed all the data and allegations against Hervé,” says Anton Leppler, director of Harness Racing for the Pennsylvania Racing Commission. “I also spoke with the folks in New York and they provided me with all the information they had. At the end of the day, take away the name. Take away Hervé Filion. Let’s just say it’s John Jones. There’s no reason in the world that he shouldn’t have a license in Pennsylvania based on the facts and information available.

“I found Filion to be very honest,” he adds, “a very straight-forward person who really cares about the ­industry.

“I knew that there would probably be some controversy about it,” Leppler admits, “but I felt very strongly it was the right decision to make. I did what I needed to do and I was comfortable with doing it. When Stan Bergstein wrote an article supporting my decision, yes, I felt good about it.”

A highly respected harness racing historian, Bergstein has witnessed the highs and lows of Filion’s career and is always struck by his accomplishments.

“Most impressive to me is that Hervé set amazing records that still stand; not only his record number of winning ­drives but 10 HTA driving championships, including six in a row,” says Bergstein. “No one else has won more than four -- those drivers being Tony Morgan and Dave Palone. Mike Lachance won three, as did John Campbell. Walter Case Jr., Ron Waples and Luc Ouellette each won two. That roster of driving greats underscores the dominance of Filion during his reign as king of the sport in the 1970s.

“The HTA formula has not changed,” adds Bergstein, “but the best in the game have not even come close to his achievements -- to his records set more than three decades ago. When Hervé won his last HTA title in 1981, the world trotting record was 1:54.4, held by Lindy’s Crown, and the pacing mark 1:49.1, by Niatross. Those records are long gone, demolished, but his remain on the books.”

Filion has always been a student of the game and his love for it -- through 80,000 career drives -- has never waned.

A native of Angers, Quebec, he started driving at the fairs at 13 years old. “My father had some horses and that’s how I started,” he says. “I loved it.”

In 1961, Filion made his first trip to the States and spent about a month at Vernon Downs. Unable to speak much English at the time, he remembers saying ‘yes’ and ‘no’ to people, without necessarily knowing what he was agreeing -- or disagreeing -- with.

One night, he remembers, he really wanted a good steak. The trouble was that he didn’t know what to do about it. His friend, Roger White, told him to go to the steak house and just ask for one, which he did. “How would you like the steak prepared?” asked the waitress, to Filion’s dismay. He made a quick recovery and ordered ham and eggs instead.

“That’s a true story,” he laughs. “I told Roger White I was really getting tired of eating ham and eggs.”

By the mid-’60s, Filion was racing more regularly south of the border and finally got his big break in Pennsylvania. “In 1965 or ‘66, John ‘Tick’ Wilcutts was the big wheel at Liberty Bell Park, winning all the races. He broke his wrist and one of his trainers came over to the barn and asked me if I’d care to drive his horses. ‘I’ve got an owner who wants you to drive,’ he said. And then I started to win left and right,” Filion recalls. “Every move was a good move on the racetrack. I had the power.”

He certainly didn’t make his career capitalizing on the misfortunes of others, but on several occasions he did benefit greatly from them. “In ‘65, Frank Mollica, the trainer of Fly Fly Byrd, shipped in to Brandywine to race against Cardigan Bay and a bunch of good horses. Buddy Gilmour couldn’t land because it was foggy so Mollica asked me to race -- and I won the race,” says Filion. “That was a big deal because I couldn’t get stalls at Brandywine and I was staying at a farm about an hour away. But after I won with Fly Fly Byrd, I was invited to lunch with the track manager. ‘If you want stalls,’ he said, ‘we’ll have stalls for you.’”

The biggest purse win of Filion’s career was with Caressable in the 1985, $632,000 Breeders Crown for two-year-old filly pacers, which yet again came at the expense of another driver. “Billy O’Donnell was supposed to go with her, but his helicopter didn’t land in time,” he says. “So I did and I won the race. I got a good trip. I got lucky.”

But one of Filion’s most memorable victories may have been with Hot Hitter in the 1979 Jug. It wasn’t what happened during the race that was memorable, but rather his showman’s trick afterward. Filion stood up in the bike coming back to the winner’s circle after the race -- a move that soon became his trademark. It wasn’t his first try at it; Filion had done the trick at least a couple of times before and for the first time at Yonkers, but it was an undeniably unique moment nonetheless.

“It was just a hot dog thing, a show off thing,” he laughs.

Even though Filion had previously won the Jug -- in upset fashion in 1971 with Nansemond -- winning it with Hot Hitter was special. “I was happy to win the race,” he says. “I would have been disappointed if I lost the Jug that day because I thought the horse was the best and he showed he was the best.”

From 1985 to 1995, Filion’s career victories soared and during that span he went from having several thousand more wins than his nearest competitor to having more than twice as many in 1995. But you can’t be that dominant without an awareness of everything going on around you. The game was changing, and Filion knew it.

“I used to race 14 or 15 horses a day and I only had two places to race,” he says. “Today, they can race twice as many. In those days there were a lot of trainer/drivers, now there are mostly trainers and catch-drivers. In one night at Yonkers there were nine races. Not 14 or 15 -- nine.”

He still enjoys watching the races today, but points out that many drivers are quick to go to the whip. Too quick, maybe. In his day, he says, drivers were kinder to their ­horses.

“You’d never have seen a guy whipping to finish sixth,” he shakes his head. “Today, I see guys hitting the horses who finish sixth and seventh. If I did that my father would be real mad at me! You know you won’t get a cheque. Why abuse the horse? You need to think about next week.

“The horse tells you a lot when you’re behind him,” adds Filion. “He tells you his strengths and his weaknesses. Sometimes you’ll ask a horse and he won’t go, but if you grab him back and coax him, he’ll go on. A lot of guys just throw the lines at them and go to the whip. If you’ve got the best horse it works, but a lot of the time you don’t need the best horse when you make those kinds of moves.”

Just as with any sport, records are made to be broken. Filion knows that one day someone will amass more wins than he has banked, and he thinks that person just might be Tim Tetrick. “The kid is a worker,” he smiles. “If he stays healthy I don’t see how he won’t beat the record. He can race 30 races a day, so he’s got the opportunity. He wants to win as much as he can right away. When I worked at it, I got luckier. That’s what I see in Tim.

“I always felt the race I couldn’t win was the one I was watching,” says Filion. “I loved to be in every race and I loved competition. My favourite racetrack was the one I could win at. There was always a challenge for me from year to year and I didn’t mind being the underdog.”

Though there is no formal plan in place just yet, don’t expect those familiar red, white and blue silks to fade without a final flourish. Filion hopes to travel throughout North America and drive at as many tracks as would welcome him.

For the tour to work the way Filion envisions it, he’ll have to wade through some familiar, unfriendly territory – he’ll have to apply for licenses in multiple jurisdictions. But that’s not his focus just now. For the moment, Filion is ­concentrating on training with his sons, Andrew and Brandon. Brandon, he says, will do most of the driving as they race through 2009 and build up their stable.

But even after his formal retirement, he absolutely won’t be stepping away from the industry any time soon. Instead, he’ll continue to work with his sons.

“The horses don’t go out of your system,” Filion insists. “They stay with you until you die. I don’t get tired of watching horses race. I’m always interested in seeing what the next guy is going to do.

“Everything I dreamed of when I was a kid came true for me,” he smiles. “It was my dream to race a horse and then jump on another one and win races. It all came true for me. I was very lucky all my life.”

“Don’t hold it against me. I was born that way.”

But it might be that he wasn’t the only lucky one, for harness racing as a whole was lucky to have Filion. Those who are a part of his farewell tour should appreciate the chance to share a moment with the legend -- a legend who may just deserve, after all these years, to hang his reins without the worries of a past long gone, memories long forgotten and allegations long ago dismissed.