LONDON, NOV. 2, 2001 — Carrland Buddy and Precious Delight established themselves as the early favourites for next weekend’s $250,000 Super Final by posting wins in their respective Gold Final races at Western Fair Raceway on Friday night.

In the two-year-old trotting colt contest Carrland Buddy and Jim McClure fired off the gate to the front from the outside Post 7 and never relinquished the lead. Crossing under the finish line two and one half lengths ahead of Gothic and Amnesiac, Carrland Buddy stopped the clock at 2:04.2.

The win was the Flak Bait colt’s second Gold Final triumph and boosted his record to five wins, three seconds and two thirds in 12 starts. It also pushed his Super Final point total to 307, more than 100 points ahead of Breeder’s Crown winner Duke Of York.

George Zirnis trains Carrland Buddy for his partners in the Smart Cat Stable of Elmira, who decided to cough up $14,000 for the colt at last fall’s yearling sales after racing his full brother Carrland Ace to an $80,000 year in the 2000 Ontario Sires Stakes.

Carrland Buddy and Zirnis’s other freshman trotting colt, Total Mayhem, will make their next start in the $250,000 Super Final at Mohawk Racetrack on Nov. 10. The top 10 point earners who have competed in at least two of the five regular season Gold events are eligible for the lucrative season finale.

Precious Delight will take a nine-race undefeated streak into next weekend’s Super Final after posting a track record 1:56.2 victory in the two-year-old pacing filly Gold Final on Friday night. The record, which shaved two-fifths of a second off the great Odies Fame’s 1998 mile, came in spite of track conditions that were rated one second slower than normal after a day of rain.

The Precious Bunny daughter controlled the race from gate-to-wire, crossing the wire one half length ahead of Hiawatha Horse Park track record holder Angel In Disguise. Go Alberta Go finished 10 and a half lengths behind the leaders in third spot. Western Fair fans were so confident in Precious Delight she returned just $2.10 to win, place and show.

Peter Heffering of Port Perry bred and owns Precious Delight, whose mother Staying Happy is a half sister to $1.7 million winner Staying Together. Duane Marfisi trains the talented lass, who will attempt to put the icing on her undefeated freshman campaign next weekend. Fans who cannot make it to Mohawk Racetrack for the $2 million Super Final Championship can catch all the action on cable television’s The Score from 9 to 11 pm EDT.

Precious Delight’s track record performance wrapped up Western Fair Raceway’s 2001 Ontario Sires Stakes season. The provincial program will return to the London half-mile in 2002 when a fresh crop of the finest trotters and pacers in North American will attempt to make their mark in the track’s history books.

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT SANDRA SNYDER AT 519-656-2017 (TEL./FAX) OR smsnyder@sentex.net.