SARNIA, ON — Ontario’s top three-year-old trotting fillies make their final Trillium Series stop at Hiawatha Horse Park on Thursday evening, with four divisions of fillies competing for a total of $65,628.
Armbro Amaze heads into the Trillium competition on a three-race win streak and trainer Frank O’Reilly would love to see the King Conch filly stretch it to four on Thursday.
“We’re really hoping she can do some good up in the Trillium, because that would make a good run for her,” says the Orton resident, who shares ownership on the filly with John Fielding of Toronto and John Jesson of Tillsonburg. “We’re looking forward to going to Sarnia.”
Regular reinsman Ross Battin will steer Armbro Amaze from Post 3 in the fourth race, tackling Gold Series regulars Snazzy Millie from Post 1 and North To Alaska from Post 8.
“This is a tough bunch,” notes O’Reilly. “Although they won’t be any tougher than the colts up at Hanover. That was kind of fun, beating the colts. We were pretty pleased with that.”
Among Armbro Amaze’s recent victories was a 1:59 score in the Aug. 2 Dream Of Glory Final at Hanover Raceway where she bested a field of seven three-year-old trotters, six of them regulars in the Ontario Sires Stakes trotting colt division. Her win streak started in the July 26 elimination and continued with a nine length romp in a Grassroots division at Hanover on Aug. 9.
“She sometimes has trouble with the racing surface, but she loved Hanover because of the cushion,” says O’Reilly. “It’s the best cushioned racetrack in Ontario. Every track should copy them You go up to Hanover and you can hardly hear the horses go by.”
Armbro Amaze will prep for Thursday’s contest with a light training mile on Tuesday and O’Reilly says his only concern heading into the $16,512 event is a virus afflicting some of the young horses in his barn.
“Mazie is good right now, but we’ve got sickness going through the barn, some of the two-year-olds are sick,” he says. “She’ll train tomorrow (Tuesday), but she doesn’t train hard; she jogs a lot and goes in the field a lot. We’d rather get longevity than have them real good for a short period of time.”
The three-year-old trotting fillies will also be featured in Races 6, 8 and 10 on Hiawatha Horse Park’s 7:10 pm program Thursday. Joining Armbro Amaze and her colleagues from the Ontario Sires Stakes program are five fillies bred outside the province, but owned by Ontario residents who opted to make them eligible for the Trillium Series.