GLOUCESTER, ON — Rideau Carleton Raceway has an outstanding evening of Ontario Sires Stakes racing lined up for fans this Sunday. Over $240,000 is up for grabs as the two-year-old pacing fillies battle in their second Gold Series Elimination appearance and the three-year-old trotting colts return to the Ottawa oval for their third Gold Final.

Making her racing debut in the second pacing filly elimination is Turquoise Baby, owned by William MacQuarrie’s 1187422 Ontario Inc. of Gloucester. The Grinfromeartoear daughter will start from Post 5 in the fourth race and trainer Herbert Holland is looking forward to seeing what the petite filly can do against her Gold Series peers.

“She’s kind of a precocious filly. She’s not a very big filly, but she doesn’t know she’s small,” says Holland. “We trained her against the colts all winter and they couldn’t head her in training trips. She’s showed a great amount of determination right on through.”

Holland and drivers Mike Saftic and Jack Moiseyev have been careful through the filly’s early qualifying efforts to channel that determination toward the later parts of the race, rather than the start.

“She’s a little excitable. She would have a tendency to get a little warm if you spun her off the gate a few times,” says the trainer. “But we were privy to that through the winter so when we trained her in sets we always trained her from the back.”

Although he does not expect to see Turquoise Baby fire off the gate Sunday, Holland would not rule out a change in strategy as the season progresses and the filly gains more racing experience.

“You have to use their natural talent and if leaving and getting spotted is what she likes to do we’ll take that into account,” notes the Milton resident.

Among the fillies Turquoise Baby will tackle in her debut is reigning Gold Final winner Bold Bidder, who will begin defence of her title from Post 8 in the fourth race.

Four races later Brancaleone is among the favourites to claim a Gold Final title after trotting to a 1:56.2 track record over the Rideau Carleton oval last weekend. The Balanced Image son will start from Post 8, and while not ideal, trainer-driver Michael Vanderkemp does not feel the outside post will have much impact on the trotter.

“It shouldn’t bother him,” says the Puslinch resident. “He can get out of the gate, so it’s not a big deal I don’t think.”

In his record setting elimination effort Brancaleone sat third for the first half of the mile before powering up the outside to the four length victory, his first through 19 lifetime starts. Vanderkemp trains the gelding for Adam Victor and Son Stable of New York, NY and says it took some time for him to grow accustomed to Brancaleone’s quirks.

“It took a while for me to get to know him. He’s pretty erratic around the stable and at the track. He’s a bit of a handful,” says the 28 year old horseman. “He’s more of a trainer-driver horse because he’s so erratic.

“He can be hard to get to the gate,” explains Vanderkemp, “But once he gets on the gate he’s a beautiful horse. You can drive him any way you want to.”

After racing against the top colts in North America for the last seven weeks, Vanderkemp altered Brancaleone’s training routine prior to the elimination and will tweak it again for this week’s contest.

“This is the first week I’m not going to train him. I left him a little fresh last week and it seemed to help,” notes the trainer. “Before that I had to take the edge off him.”

Brancaleone will test the new routine in Race 8 on Rideau Carleton Raceway’s Sunday evening program, which begins at 6:30 pm. The two-year-old pacing fillies battle in Races 2, 4 and 6 for a top three spot and a return invitation to the Gloucester oval for their Gold Final on Sunday, July 24.

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