Winners Push Power Plays To Edge; Pick 4s Partial To Public; $27 Winner Leads List Of Four Double-Digit Scores

Another full week of selected features included a few Power Plays and some Partners For Picks (PFP). Our suggested contenders were active and productive in any and all exotics. We hope they assisted so your wagers resulted in generous returns. Chronologically, here are the good and bad news on our servings.

Thursday, Dec. 21 was a tough night for our suggestions at the Meadowlands, as two favorites, a pair of second-favorites and one third choice from the public chalked up the results. Our single feature was won by a cheap favorite, while our choices, Duluth (21-1) finished seventh and Brookroaddonnie (44-1) was 10^th.

Our P4P at the Meadowlands resulted in one show win, Whataorse ($5.60) from leg two of the Pick 4 lost to the public favorite. Lesser-priced winners defeated us in leg one as About The Benjamins (53-1) finished eighth. Leg three put up a 23-1 upset while our contender, 18-1 Fox Valley Cadet, finished sixth, as did our leg-four choice, Yankee Artilery (4-1).

At Dayton Thursday night we did much better, nabbing the winner of the Power-Plays quartet with Karefree Kara ($10.20, $3.80, $3.80 ok). Fourth in the superfecta was our choice, Art Critic (9-1). We missed the board with Beach Club (9-2), who finished ninth. That “super” (two for four from us) paid $49.47.

Friday, Dec. 22, our selected feature at Northfield lost to a public choice. We had Misevil (9-1).

We headed to the great Canadian west for Northlands Park’s third race and a Power Plays attack. We named the winner, the public’s second choice, Nightime Chase ($6.60, $3.10, $2.70), and contributed to the triactor and super with Alexas Princess ($3.10), finishing third. Off the board for us were Odds Western Three (4-1), finishing seventh, and Golden Echo (10-1), finishing fifth. The triactor (two of three from us) paid $43.60; the super (two of four from us) paid $112.30. 

Saturday’s afternoon action at Western Fair was a PFP in a Win 4, as it is called at the London raceway. We suggested four contenders, unfortunately two of them galloped and were eliminated from their miles—Falcon Justice (7-1) in leg two and Zippo (16-1) in leg three, finishing eighth and fifth, respectively. In leg one we were off the board with Regal Again (15-1), beaten by the public’s second choice, and in leg four we surrendered to another favorite with Drake (11-1), who finished fourth.

All losers in our selected features appear the following week in the H2W list.


H2W LIST RESULTS

The H2W results list across-the-board prices. Also, exactas listed are included when a H2W horse finishes second with a race favorite or the first two finishers making up the exacta are H2W horses (an asterisk appears when both horses were listed to complete a cold exacta). The note “ok” determines that prices published are correct even when a show price exceeds a place price or any or all of the prices are the same. This week, there were 34 active horses (a 21-percent win hit rate and a 38-percent ATB [across-the-board] hit rate).

Please note that some H2W results reflect win, place, show and exotic results occurring by press time but some horses race after the blog is posted (we list them the following week) It is up to you to follow horses that have not performed before this weekly review

Winners

Cantab Lindy, $27.60, $9.60, $6.00, Dayton
Lordbullville, $18.60, $5.50, $5.50 ok, Monticello
Donna Party, $17.80, $6.50, $3.80, Rideau-Carleton
Mach Power, $12.10, $6.60, $5.40, Pompano
HF Princess Peach, $5.00, $3.40, $2.80, Northlands
Rosie Rosso, $4.40, $3.20, $2.10, Monticello
After Market, $3.60, $2.90, $2.10, Rideau-Carleton

Seconds

Nitro Seelster, $3.40, $2.40 (Exacta $15.40), Meadows
Sunshine West, $2.40, $2.20, Meadowlands

Thirds

Warum Hanover, $6.80, Rosecroft
Bar Wine, $5.40, Pompano
JJ Flynn, $3.40, Dover
Business As Usual, $2.10, Rideau-Carleton


News & Notes

EDITORIAL: The season’s Dan Patch Award winners, voted for by the United States Harness Writers Association (USHWA), were, again predictable. However, our personal opinion on one of the winners was a surprise and another reason USHWA voters are parochial. There were only two candidates, Downbytheseaside and Fear The Dragon, both trained by Brian Brown. The former was given the award, based mostly on his last four races. Fear The Dragon was the top sophomore all season and defeated his stable mate in major contests. He became sick coming into the Breeders Crown and was only barely able to recover in time to be second to Downbytheseaside in the Progress Pace. All voters saw were those races “Down” won while “Fear” was ill, and they allowed them to discount an entire season of superb performances by Fear, many of which saw defeat for Down. Healthy, it is no doubt which was the finer and more productive colt.

After Woodbine’s annual harness program on Boxing Day, Dec. 26, harness racing at the track enters its final few months before leaving the racetrack’s agenda for good. Standardbred racing in Ontario has been assigned a new permanent home when it owns year-long residence at Mohawk, beginning in April, 2018. The tradition of the Boxing Day matinee in Toronto dates back to the days when the circuit included Greenwood Raceway. The day-after-Christmas program was always a big attraction with high attendance and wagering figures. It is bound to continue once Mohawk is the sole theater for sulkies.
 
The 2017 Batavia Downs meet ended Dec, 16. The New York State track’s export signal drew an increased handle of 15.9 percent over 2016 and total betting was up 8.1 percent. So, $8.2 million was wagered on Batavia racing programs, the most handled at the facility since Western Regional OTB purchased the track in 2002. Larry Stalbaum won his first Batavia driving title with 134 wins. Second was Ray Fisher, Jr. with 124 and third was Drew Monti with 123. On the conditioner side, Kim Asher won her first Batavia training title in a romp with 94 wins, 52 ahead of J.D. Perrin. Maria Rice was third.

The finale of the 150-day harness meet at Philly was Dec. 17. As usual, driver of the meet was Pennsylvania’s perennial leading sulky-sitter, George Napolitano, Jr. It was Geroge’s 12th dash- title at Philly, after being crowned again at Pocono. George had 316 wins from 1,376 starts and purse earnings over $3.2 million. Tim Tetrick finished second in the driver category but earned more than George at Philly, totaling over $3.4 million with 274 wins. California replant Gilbert Garcia-Herrera was the leading trainer with 111 wins in 395 starts and purses of $1-million-plus. Ron Burke finished second, though he won more money, with earnings of $1.5 million


Extraordinary Extras

Indulge in many standardbred topics at my Hoof Beats blog titled Vast Performances.

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