The Hambletonian Trail: Trotting Trials As Dexter Cup, Lady Suffolk Set Stage For The New Season

May 5 marks the start of the 2018 season for three-year-old colt and filly trotters eligible to the sport’s premier events—The Hambletonian and Hambletonian Oaks—to pave their paths to the first Saturday in August, at the Meadowlands.

The Dexter Cup for the colts and the Lady Suffolk for the fillies, features on May 5 at Freehold highlight, once again, this exclusive Hambletonian Trail blog.

The exclusive addition to our TwinSpires harness menu will follow the two divisions week in and week out through their schedules of high-class races in order to make the grade for the top events.

As is our trade through this time, we analyze races which include eligible colts and fillies as the fields of ultra-competitive trotters earn their ways into berths for shots at stardom.

In the $133,800 Dexter Cup Final there are eight starters; four of them are eligible to the Hambletonian. One of them, Vic’s Winner, will attract much of the wagering weight with two wins in three starts and the most earnings in the short season so far.

The remaining trio eyeing August consists of Thrust Control, Don and Maxus. The latter two are making their sophomore debuts in this feature while representing brand-name trainers, Julie Miller and Jimmy Takter, respectively.

Marcus Melander’s Thrust Control, though he is just competing in his second start at three, may be the valuable win wager among the eligible quartet. Certainly he should be strong in the mix if the favorite takes the mile.

Filly Feast

The $66,400 Lady Suffolk  for the soph-filly trotters has eight at the gate, with four eligible “Oaks” gals: D’bomb, Treasure Dreams, Winbak Noelle and Andovermizbrenda. D’bomb debuts at three in this affair for Ron Burke, she being the only one with no races yet in 2018.

Treasure Dreams has already raced in 10 miles, spreading out four wins, a place and two shows to have accumulated the top earnings for the bunch. Close in earnings are two other Oaks hopefuls, Andovermizbrenda and our choice, Winbak Noelle.

Lucas Wallin’s Explosive Matter filly has opened her soph season winning her first start. She has a slight post advantage over Andovermizbrenda, who has also won her first effort. But the latter is being guided by the popular George Brennan and bettors are apt to trust his prowess on the half mile a bit more than David Miller (on Winback Noelle).

This allows for our support of Winbak Noelle

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Follow Hambletonian Trail action from in this blog on Twitter #Hambo18 and @FrankCotolo in cooperation with the Hambletonian Society.