CAMPBELLVILLE, NOV. 6, 2001 — A total of $2 million is on the line at Mohawk Racetrack on Saturday night when the top trotters and pacers from the Ontario Sires Stakes program go head-to-head in their season ending Super Finals.
For the last six months some of the most talented Standardbreds ever to come out of the province have been collecting points in each Gold Series event, aiming for a berth in one of Saturday’s $250,000 Super Final divisions. With only 10 spots on the starting gate the competition has been tremendous all season with track records crumbling in six divisions at five different racetracks and new all-time Ontario Sires Stakes records being established by the two-year-old pacing colts and three-year-old pacing fillies.
Freshman pacing colt Pacific Titan heads into Saturday’s battle off a 1:52.4 Ontario Sires Stakes and track record performance at Windsor Raceway on Nov. 3 and trainer Scott McEneny says the Camluck colt is sharper than he has been all season.
“He has always had high speed right from day one,” says the Cambridge resident. “He schooled faster than he raced back in July. It was just a matter of teaching him to use it. Right now he’s at his peak.”
John Grant of Hornby owns the half-brother to $2.33 million winner Pacific Rocket, who will tackle the talent-laden two-year-old pacing colt field from Post 9 on Saturday in an attempt to deposit another sizeable sum into his $398,379 bank account.
“He doesn’t draw very well, but he can leave pretty fast,” says McEneny. “They will all probably be looking to sit close to him.”
As the colts line up behind the gate in Race 5 McEneny will be keeping an eye on division point leader Daylon Frontier from Post 4, two-time Gold Final winner Camystic from Post 6 and the Gold Elimination winner from Windsor, Ifihadyourluck, from Post 2.
The two-year-old trotting fillies kick off the $2 million showdown in Race 1 and all of the top fillies have polished up their dancing shoes for the season finale.
Division leader Corinas Mission has been carefully prepped for Saturday’s contest and trainer Dan Clements is hoping that the resource centre established by his cousin Corina Clements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, which receives 20 per cent of her earnings, can cash another cheque next week.
“She is healthy and looking good,” says the Uxbridge resident, who opted to skip the last Gold Series with his two-time Gold Final winner. “This whole year has really been by design and we just didn’t feel that going there would do anything for her. We wanted a fresh horse at the end of the year.”
The only disappointment in the filly’s young career came in the Oct. 12 Breeders Crown Eliminations when she made an early break in stride that took her out of contention. Clements, who trains the Mr Lavec daughter for his father Norm Clements’ Prince Lee Acres in Stouffville, attributes the problem to an equipment change he made after her Oct. 1 Gold Final win.
“In the Gold Final she was getting on one line so I put a Murphy Blind on her. I put one on at Elmira and she ran there too, but I trained her with it before the Breeders Crown and she trained real good so I decided to race her with it,” he explains. “It was a real disappointment. I’m not putting a Murphy Blind on her this week.”
Corinas Mission has already contributed $32,000 to the Santa Cruz centre — which helps children and families break free from the cycle of poverty, drug abuse and prostitution — and will attempt to add to that from Post 2 on Saturday.
Some of her toughest competition will come from the fillies who sit just below her in the point standings. Crown Lavec, one of two Bob McIntosh trainees in the race, and Pepi Lavec, one of two entries from the John Bax barn, will start from Posts 4 and 9. Meanstoyourdreams, who captured the Nov. 2 Gold Final at Windsor Raceway, will make her bid for a second straight win from Post 3 and trainer Richard McNeill hopes that all the pieces fall as perfectly as they did last weekend for the Royal Strength daughter.
“Basically she was just given all the breaks. There were some horses parked, some horses made breaks and a couple got locked in,” says the Brantford resident, who shares ownership on the filly with Mike Henowick of Hamilton and Bentley Clark of Brantford. “It seems that once a horse breaks through a certain speed barrier it’s easier for them to do it again so we’ll hope for some luck this week and see what happens.”
The Super Final events go postward in Races 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. The two-year-old trotting filly, trotting colt, pacing filly and pacing colt events are the first four races and the three-year-olds will wrap up the $2 million event in the same order.
Fans who cannot make it to the Campbellville oval on Saturday night can catch all the drama and excitement of the Ontario Sires Stakes season finale on cable television’s The Score from 9 to 11 pm EDT.