LONDON, ON — Ontario Sires Stakes action returns to Western Fair Raceway on Saturday evening with seven Grassroots divisions for the two-year-old pacing colts.
Trainer Daryl Roberts will start two colts in the $108,843 event and the London resident is looking for a strong outing from both Fast Factor and Total Impact. Fast Factor is first out of the gate for the Roberts’ stable, starting from Post 5 in Race 1, and the trainer is expecting an improved effort from the seventh-place finish the Apaches Fame son delivered in the Sept. 23 Grassroots event at Hiawatha Horse Park.
“In his last start at Sarnia (Sept. 23) he faded a little bit so I had him scoped afterwards and he scoped a little bit sick,” says Roberts. “We treated him and trained him back twice — we didn’t race him — and he seems a lot better now.”
Roberts and Thomas Lawson of London offered up $32,000 to acquire the colt out of the Aug. 29 Summer Sizzler Sale at the Western Fair Sales Pavilion, and in his first start for the pair Fast Factor scored a runner-up finish in a Sept. 4 Flamboro Breeders event.
“We got him off Carl (Jamieson) at the Summer Sizzler Sale,” recalls Roberts. “I called Carl and he told us how to rig the horse up and he raced good in the Flamboro Breeders, finished second. He’s got good gate speed so in London he should be able to get spotted pretty good.”
Through five Grassroots starts Fast Factor has posted one win, two seconds and one third for a point total of 112. He currently sits fifth in the point standings and is virtually assured of a berth in the Grassroots Semifinal at Hiawatha Horse Park on Oct. 28.
Total Impact has had an equally successful season on the Grassroots circuit, logging one win, one second, one third and two fourth-place finishes for a total of 103 points and sole ownership of eighth spot in the division standings. Owned by breeder Lawson and Donald Douglas and John Shepley of Ingersoll, the Astreos son will make his bid for a second Ontario Sires Stakes victory from Post 4 in the fourth race on Western Fair’s Saturday evening program.
“The four-hole should be really good for him,” says Roberts. “He can race from on the front or come-from-behind. That’s what he did in the Battle of Waterloo Consolation, sat at the back and then swooped them.”
Total Impact heads into Saturday’s event off a fourth-place finish in the Sarnia event, and Roberts expects a minor equipment change to result in a stronger performance from the young pacer at Western Fair.
“Reg Gassien drove him in his last start and he had trouble putting him a hole, he was out for most of the mile,” says the trainer. “So I’ve trained him twice with pop out ear plugs and I think we’ll race him in those to try and keep him more relaxed.
“We’ll need some racing luck,” adds Roberts. “But they both should be really close, I hope. Then we’ll go into Sarnia and see what happens in the Semifinal.”
The top 16 point earners will advance out of Saturday’s event to the Grassroots Semifinal at Hiawatha Horse Park on Oct. 28 with the top four finishers from each Semifinal moving on to the $100,000 Grassroots Championship.
Fast Factor and his peers in the first race parade onto the Western Fair Raceway oval at 7:30 pm Saturday, with the remaining divisions of freshman pacing colts battling in Races 2, 3, 4, 7, 8, and 9.