ELMIRA, ON — For the second time this summer a talented group of two-year-old trotting colts will gather at Elmira Raceway when the Waterloo County oval showcases six Grassroots divisions on Monday night.
The Grassroots regulars will be joined in Elmira by a number of Gold Series competitors taking advantage of the event’s wild card status. One of the six regular season Grassroots events in each division is designated a wild card, which allows the top level competitors to drop down without being required to miss a corresponding Gold event.
Among the colts hoping to keep the Gold Series regulars out of the running is Ode To Earl, who leapt into fourth spot in the Grassroots standings with a victory at Quinte Raceway on Aug. 5. The Earl son, trained by Guelph’s Keith Kurtz, heads into Monday’s $15,000 contest off a sharp qualifier over Elmira’s half-mile oval on Aug. 26.
“He won at Belleville, but I didn’t get to Ottawa with him,” says Kurtz. “He got sick after Belleville so I qualified him Monday night at Elmira and he qualified good.”
Kurtz’s brother Gary of Ariss and Murray Cox of Rockwood share ownership of Ode To Earl, who was an $11,000 purchase at last October’s Forest City Yearling Sale. In three starts the colt has almost repaid the partners their initial investment, earning $10,720 with a win, a fourth and a fifth-place finish. Ode To Earl’s first and fifth-place finishes in Grassroots action have earned him 55 points, and another solid effort at Elmira Raceway on Monday night will virtually guarantee the colt a spot in the Grassroots post season.
“He’s turning out to be okay. It was a little tricky getting him going, that’s why he shows all the qualifiers early, but he seems to have it together now,” notes Kurtz. “He’s a nice Grassrooter.”
Ode To Earl and driver Jim McClure will make their bid for a second Grassroots victory from Post 1 in the tenth race on Monday and Kurtz hopes the youngster can replicate his Aug. 5 win, when he also started from Post 1, without the break that occurred at the start.
“He had the rail in Belleville too. They charted him with a break leaving, but I think that he broke before the start,” notes Kurtz. “What happened was the gate got down over top of the pylons and threw everything off.
“Hopefully everything goes well at Elmira. It’s kind of our home track and we’ll get everybody up there cheering him on.”
Ode To Earl will face a pair of colts sitting right behind him in the point standings when he lines up behind the gate on Monday. Both Wireless Image (Post 2) and Hawaiian Clipper (Post 5) were winners in their Grassroots debut at Rideau Carleton Raceway on Aug. 18 and will be looking to add to their 50 point totals.
Elmira Raceway’s call to the post sounds at 6:45 pm on Monday night for the two-year-old trotting colts who will open the program in Race 1 and also compete in Races 3, 4, 6, 8, and 10 before the exciting evening of holiday Monday harness racing draws to a close.