WINDSOR, ON — Windsor Raceway’s last Ontario Sires Stakes series of the season features the three-year-old trotting fillies, and the world class youngsters get things under way with two $49,681 Gold Eliminations on Sunday evening.
Six of the 12 fillies entered in Sunday’s event competed in the Breeders Crown Eliminations against North America’s best, with McCall Magic and Peaceful Way advancing to the Oct. 23 Final where they finished fifth and eighth. The talented Angus Hall daughters will meet up again in Sunday’s eleventh race, with McCall Magic drawing Post 1 and reigning Gold Final champion Peaceful Way starting from Post 6.
“I’d rather have the outside in the other division,” says McCall Magic’s trainer Dr. John Hayes. “Any time you draw in with Peaceful Way it’s not a nice draw.”
Through 18 starts this season McCall Magic has tallied seven wins, four seconds and one third and has never missed earning a cheque. Among her victories are two Gold Finals, two Gold Eliminations, the Canadian Breeders Championship Elimination and Final and a Flamboro Breeders division. She has earned $395,228 and owns Ontario Sires Stakes speed records on half-mile and seven-eighths mile tracks, but in head-to-head competition Peaceful Way is leading four races to two.
“But I don’t want to complain,” cautions Hayes. “I’d much rather be the subject of the story than sitting at home reading the story.”
Over the next three weeks driver Steve Condren and McCall Magic will attempt to craft a happy ending to the tale, and Hayes is confident that the consistent filly will be ready to give her all in the three races remaining on her sophomore calendar — Sunday’s elimination, the Nov. 7 Gold Final and the Nov. 13 Super Final at Woodbine Racetrack.
“She’s a trying son of a gun. One of the most remarkable things about the Breeders Crown Final — and it wouldn’t show on a chart line — when we got her home that night she had a haemorrhage in one eye and we didn’t know where it had come from. But when you watch the replay and watch it in slow motion you can see one of her competitors hit her in the eye with a whip. You can see her give her head a few shakes and then keep right on going,” says the trainer. “She finds new ways to impress me every week.”
Hayes shares ownership on McCall Magic with Michael Horgan of Toronto, Press Time Stable of Tillsonburg and Kim Kaplan of Worcester, MA. The partners, who also bred the filly, have relished every moment of her sophomore season regardless of where she finished in proximity to her main Ontario Sires Stakes rival.
“The group is having a lot of fun,” says the Beamsville resident. “And we have no illusions that we have to be the best to have fun.
“We’ll just show up, put the lines in Condren’s hands and hope for the best.”
The top four finishers in each three-year-old trotting filly elimination, plus one fifth-place finisher selected by random draw, will advance to next Sunday’s $100,000 Gold Final. The eliminations are slated as Races 9 and 11 on Windsor Raceway’s program this Sunday, with the first race of the evening going postward at 6 pm.