INNISFIL, ON — Georgian Downs fans, owners, trainers and drivers will all be rushing for riches on Saturday night as the Innisfil oval hosts its annual Gold Rush event, featuring a total purse of $1 million and the potential for one lucky race-goer to take home a $100,000 prize.
Fans that can tear themselves away from the gold mine of trackside activities — including old fashioned country carnival games, horse and buggy rides, a children’s activity centre and the country and western entertainment — will be captivated by the wealth of talent appearing in four $130,000 Gold Series Finals and four Masters Series Finals.
In elimination action for the Gold Series Finals last weekend, three-year-old trotting filly Cross Of Lorraine set a track and Ontario Sires Stakes (OSS) record with her 1:55.2 victory, and trainer Carl Jamieson expects the filly to be just as good from Post 5 in the Final.
“I think, if everything goes right, she’ll jog up there Saturday night,” says the Princeton, ON resident. “But things have got to go right.”
In addition to an OSS record, Cross Of Lorraine boasts four wins through six sophomore starts, but the path to the winner’s circle has not been a smooth one for the daughter of Angus Hall and Katya Hanover. Purchased by Jamieson and his partners Thomas Kyron of Toronto, ON and Hope Johnson of London, ON for $50,000 from the 2008 Canadian Open Yearling Sale, Cross Of Lorraine made just three starts as a two-year-old before Jamieson decided to press the pause button on her career.
“We x-rayed her knees and she had a lot of lines and cracks and stuff, so we quit racing her thinking she would come back as a three-year-old healed, but it wasn’t so,” explains the horseman. “She’s one of those that take a long time to heal.”
Cross Of Lorraine spent the winter in Florida, where another set of x-rays indicated that the healing process was not complete, so the partners scaled back their hopes for the flawlessly gaited youngster to focus exclusively on the Ontario Sires Stakes program. Jamieson altered the filly’s routine to include swimming, magnetic therapy, and treatment in a hyperbaric chamber in an attempt to speed up her healing process. So far the approach looks like the right one, as the filly seems to gain strength with each start, but Jamieson remains cautious.
“I tell my partners every race could be the last one,” he explains. “It’s a shame, she’s a beautiful gaited filly, she doesn’t wear a thing.”
Paul Mackenzie will be back in the race bike for Friday’s Gold Final, and Jamieson says the veteran reinsman knows Cross Of Lorraine faces some stiff competition from the fillies lining up to her left. Starting at Post 2 is Emmylou Who, who finished a narrowly beaten second in the $557,000 Elegantimage Final at Mohawk Racetrack on June 26. From Post 3 is reigning Gold Final champion Random Destiny, and from Post 4 is last week’s other elimination winner Ipromisenottotell.
A pitched battle between the four talented young trotters could make Cross Of Lorraine’s OSS record a very brief notation in the provincial history books.
Four races after the sophomore trotting fillies square off, the trotting colts will take centre stage on the Gold Rush program, and trainer Chad Milner will send a pair of contenders into the $130,000 fray.
The headliner from the Milner barn is elimination winner Windsun Galaxie, who cruised to a 1:55.1 score last weekend. The Kadabra son, bred and owned by Harley Harkness’ Windsun Farm Inc. of Uxbridge, ON, will make his tenth start of the season in the Gold Final, and Milner says the leggy youngster has already exceeded expectations.
“He was a nice horse last year as a two-year-old, he was just really big. I was lucky Harley agreed to shut him down,” explains Milner. “I had him in Florida through the winter and he showed he could trot. I said he’d trot in 1:55 to Harley before we started the year.”
Raced just two times as a freshman, Windsun Galaxie has more than made up for it this season with four wins, two seconds, one third, one fourth and one fifth in nine starts for earnings of $117,800. Last weekend’s victory was the colt’s first in provincial action, and Milner knows the youngster will have to fight tooth and nail for every additional piece of OSS hardware.
“It’s very competitive, there are lots of horses — Text Me, Blair Burgess’ horse (Arriba Amigo) — that can win depending on how the trip unfolds,” says the trainer.
Working in Windsun Galaxie’s favour on Saturday is a better post position than he has drawn for any stake final so far this season. Rather than Post 10, the colt and driver Paul MacDonell will start from Post 6.
Stablemate Celebrity Ferrari and driver Jack Moiseyev will benefit from Post 2 in their first ever Gold Final appearance. The Ken Warkentin son finished third behind Arriba Amigo in his elimination last week, and Milner was suitably impressed.
“I got him four days before that race,” says the horseman, who conditions the colt for Celebrity Farms of New York, NY. “Staffan (Lind) said he was better than he looked on paper, and he was right.”
Last week’s outing was just Celebrity Ferrari’s second of the season, so the colt should be even sharper for Saturday’s $130,000 Final.
In addition to the lucrative purse money up for grabs on Saturday, the breeders of all four Gold Final winners will receive a $3,000 credit toward the purchase of an Ontario-sired yearling at the 2010 yearling sales, compliments of the Standardbred Breeders of Ontario Association.
Mining for all of the on and off track riches will begin at 7:25 pm on Saturday, with the Gold Finals slated as Races 3, 4, 7, and 9, and the Masters Series Finals for aged trotters and pacers going in behind the Georgian Downs gate in Races 5, 6, 8 and 10.
For complete entries please go to: http://www.standardbredcanada.ca/racing/entries/data/e0710geodfn.dat.