ELMIRA, ON — Ontario Sires Stakes action returns to Elmira Raceway in a big way on Monday night with 11 Grassroots divisions for the three-year-old pacing colts.
Last year’s Grassroots champion Corona Grande will begin defence of his title in the last division, Race 14 on Elmira’s 6:45 pm program. The Camluck colt was bested just once in his freshman campaign and heads into the Victoria Day contest off a nine-length romp in a Windsor Raceway qualifier on May 8.
Jack Darling of Windsor trains Corona Grande for his partner Dan Smith of Dorchester and the duo hopes to add half of the $15,000 purse to the $104,421 the talented colt earned in 2001.
Corona Grande will be joined at Elmira by many of his two-year-old rivals, but there are also a sizeable number of new faces hoping to make an impact on the Grassroots Series. Although Rye N Water made two starts in the Ontario Sires Stakes last season, injury kept him from playing a major role and trainer Keith Waples is hoping that things work out differently for the Pacific Rocket son this year.
“He just got sore last year,” explains the Guelph resident. “He seems to be better this year. I don’t know just how good he is, but we’ll find out I guess.”
Rye N Water heads into Monday’s race off a solid 1:58.1 victory in a non-winners of one race event at Flamboro Downs on May 9. The colt and driver Randy Waples led wire-to-wire from the six-hole, leaving the field more than six lengths behind, so he should have no trouble handling Post 5 in Elmira’s third race on Monday.
“He’s quite a big colt, but he makes the turns all right,” says the Hall of Fame horseman, who shares ownership on Rye N Water with Charles Muylaert of Nobleton. “But (May 9) he was in with a bunch of maidens and this will be a different story. I’d like to have got a couple more starts into him, but we didn’t get it done.”
Among the horses Rye N Water will face in Race 3 is Cliftons Revenge, who banked $59,329 in Ontario Sires Stakes action last season and comes into 2002 off a sharp 1:57.1 qualifier at Mohawk Racetrack on May 14.
The top five finishers in each of the 11 divisions will share $15,000 and earn points toward one of 16 berths in the Grassroots Semifinal. The three-year-old pacing colts will rev their engines in Races 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, and 14 on Elmira Raceway’s 6:45 pm program Monday.