WINDSOR, ON — Ontario’s exciting freshman trotting colts leap back into action at Windsor Raceway on Sunday, headlining the track’s Family Fun evening.
The colts will compete for a total of $116,112 in four Gold Series Eliminations, with just the top two finishers, and one third-place finisher drawn by lot, earning a ticket back to the five-eighths mile oval for the $130,000 Gold Final next weekend. Hoping to be among the nine colts earning their way into the lucrative Final are a pair hailing from La Salle based trainer Bob McIntosh’s barn. In Conchnito and Tyrone Burberry will attempt to score a top two finish from Post 7 in the seventh race and Post 8 in Race 11.
“There’s a small margin for error with that many divisions,” says McIntosh, last season’s top trainer in the Ontario Sires Stakes program. “But hopefully they can overcome the odds and get to next week.”
In Conchnito heads into Sunday’s battle off an impressive 2:02 victory in a Flamboro Breeders event on July 19, and finished fourth in the season opening Gold Elimination in spite of suffering interference at the three-quarter mark.
“In Conchnito is a very nice colt. He raced good in Flamboro, but the bigger racetrack will suit him better,” says McIntosh. “He got around the turns all right, but he’ll be better on a big track.”
McIntosh and his partners Dave Boyle of Bowmanville and CSX Stables of Liberty Center, OH bred In Conchnito and were expecting good things from the King Conch son long before he made his June 25 debut in a Windsor Raceway qualifier.
“We raised him and he was good looking from the time he hit the ground,” says McIntosh. “And he trained down like a nice colt all along.
“I don’t like the post position Sunday, but I really like this colt,” adds the veteran horseman.
Like In Conchnito, Tyrone Burberry will be handicapped by an outside post in Race 11, but McIntosh hopes the young trotter’s steady style will see him advance to next week’s big show.
“He’s a nice steady colt. He caught a bell boot in his last start at Flamboro, but other than that he has been pretty sure footed,” says the trainer. “He’s a colt that will get better as the year goes on.”
McIntosh and Boyle share ownership on Tyrone Burberry, a half brother to top Grassroots three-year-old Tyrone Dillon. The King Conch son finished fifth in his Flamboro Breeders event after recovering from the early break and was a solid third in his Gold Elimination on July 2.
McIntosh has altered his Ontario Sires Stakes strategy this season as he attempts to earn a third straight Johnston Cup title as the program’s top trainer. Rather than getting a jump on the competition in the early going, he is concentrating on managing each horse’s schedule to ensure they are around for the Grassroots Championships and Super Finals in October and November.
“The year is so long I was, on purpose, cautious about bringing them along too early, especially the two-year-olds,” he explains. “You have to be careful or by the fall you can have just a mane and tail left.
“If they’re good enough they’ll catch up, and if they’re no good there’s nothing you can do about it anyway.”
In Conchnito and Tyrone Burberry and their peers star in Races 5, 7, 9 and 11 on Windsor Raceway’s Family Fun program Sunday. The festivities, which include an appearance by the World’s Smallest Horse “Peanut,” bike draws, pony rides, face painting and a petting zoo, get under way at 5:30 pm with the first race going postward at 6:30 pm. Families will also enjoy $1 hot dogs, ice cream, fries, pop, coffee and popcorn.