The 2021 season kicked off in grand fashion with an action packed Tuesday evening (Jan. 5) program at Red Shores Racetrack and Casino at the Charlottetown Driving Park.
Benefitting from an early tussle, Winter Blast circled up to win the $2,600 featured pace on the 11-dash program to close out a training triple for conditioner Jennifer Doyle.
With No other tracks racing in the nation currently, the triple marks Doyle as the leading dash winning trainer in Canada. The Earnscliffe horsewoman and driver Ken Murphy teamed to win with Winter Blast in 1:58.4 after pacesetter Creepin took on favourite Rockin Indy and parked him to a cut throat :56.3 half-mile station. Winter Blast circled from last to win the race by two lengths over second-place Sports Royalty while Creepin held third.
Off the pace was the recipe for success for Smart Official in the featured Boxing Day pace on Saturday afternoon at Red Shores Racetrack and Casino at the Charlottetown Driving Park.
Creepin (Driven by David Dowling) cut out the early fractions in the $2,500 feature over a sloppy track with splits of :29.1 and 1:00.3. That leader then came under siege by Sports Royalty (Gilles Barrieau) first on the outside with race favourite Smart Official and driver Jason Hughes following the flow second-over. The three-quarters was reached in 1:31.4 with the field tightening up in the final stanza as Smart Official found his way through to win by three-quarters of a length in 2:02. Sports Royalty was second with Creepin third.
Last week Smart Official laid down the fractions to one of the fastest Winter miles in the history of Eastern Canada harness racing, but will look to go all the way Saturday afternoon (Dec. 26) on the Boxing Day program at Red Shores Racetrack and Casino at the Charlottetown Driving Park.
The 14-dash Boxing Day card has a 12:30 p.m. (AST) opening post time with the $2,500 featured pace aligning in Race 13. Smart Official was on top for the majority of his latest start, but fell victim to Screen Test in the final panel in a spectacular 1:55.3 mile. With that preferred foe out of the picture, Smart Official will look to take advantage of post 4 on Saturday afternoon with Jason Hughes at the controls for trainer and co-owner Peter Lanigan and co-owner Sandra Stead of Montague. Creepin defeated the top class on Tuesday evening and gets post 3 to work from on Saturday for trainer-driver David Dowling, while Gordie Hennessey will sit up on Silverhill Buddy from post 1 from the David Myers
Pillage And Burn has not been spotted out of the top two places in months and will attempt to keep his miraculous feat moving forward on a special Tuesday evening (Dec. 22) card of racing at Red Shores Racetrack and Casino at the Charlottetown Driving Park.
The 10-dash Tuesday card has a 6 p.m. (EST) opening post time with the featured pace lining up in Race 9 of the evening for a $2,300 purse. Pillage And Burn has been one-two in all of his outings since Sept. 26 and the Trevor Hicken trained pacer receives the honour of morning line favourite in Tuesday’s top event. Ken Murphy will steer the nine-year-old son of Cams Card Shark for owner Perry Burke of Grosse-Ile., Quebec.