Kadabra waved the flag for Ontario when the Breeders Crown weekend kicked off last night at the Meadowlands and Ontario sires were very well represented and more than held their own.
The leading Canadian trotting sire for many years (and second in North America to Muscle Hill) Kadabra is now 17 and looks fantastic when we visited with him yesterday at Tara Hills Stud near Port Perry, Ontario. Kadabra had three starters in the two trotting events last night and the trio all went home with cheques.
Flanagan Memory, outside, gets up to win over the great Resolve. (Lisa Photo)
Flanagan Memory, who is now third on the list of Kadabra’s richest performers, downed the giant Resolve in the open trot. The six-year-old is now 6-1-4 in 14 trips behind the gate this year for $663,000 in earnings and $1.59 million lifetime.
The only other son of Kadabra in the race, Windsun Revenge, finished a good fourth after cutting the mile for Scott Zeron.
What’s also interesting to note about this field in terms of the influence of Ontario is that the second, third and fourth place performers – Resolve, J L Cruze and Windsun Revenge – were all foaled in Ontario.
Bee A Magician, Kadabra’s richest performer with well over $4 million banked to date, finished second to Hannelore Hanover in the Open Mare contest. In just her second start back since suffering a tendon injury, Queen Bee was trapped on the rail with tons of trot and nowhere to go down the stretch, otherwise she could have remained undefeated in five starts this year.
On the pacing side, in the open pace division dominated this year by Always B Miki and Wiggle It Jiggleit, Mach It So picked up the fifth cheque with a solid performance. The six-year-old gelding by Mach Three, who shares the stallion barn at Tara Hills Stud with Kadabra, now has $1.5 million on his card.
Mach Three, also 17, is currently enjoying breeding season down under. Mach It So is now his third richest performer of all time (Somebeachsomewhere of course is number one). Sitting right behind in fourth on that list is Solar Sister who finished fourth in the Open Mare final won by another Ontario-sired mare, Lady Shadow.
Lady Shadow is the richest performer of her sire Shadow Play. His second richest offspring is Skippin By who was fifth in that race giving Ontario sires three of the top five spots in that Breeders Crown final.
Tonight at the Meadowlands the eight Breeders Crown finals go postward for the two- and three-year-old performers. The Tara Hills’ duo will have a chance to add to their laurels as Mach Three has a starter in the 2pf final in Blameitonthenight while Kadabra is represented by the very talented Caprice Hill and Emoticon Hanover in the three-year-old trotting filly split. They both finished an impressive second in their respective elims last week.
There are three other Ontario-sired fillies in the same split: the Manofmanymissions daughter Celebrity Eventsy who will leave from post five for John Campbell, Dustin Jones’ Dewdle All Day (Deweycheatumnhowe) in post six with James MacDonald down to drive and another Dewey daughter, Flowers N Song in post nine.
In the two-year-old trotting colt feature three of the colts have Ontario-sired dams: Walner and Sire John F (both dams by Ken Warkentin) and Peter Haughton winner What The Hill whose dam is an Angus Hall daughter.
Muscle Hustle, Per Henriksen’s Muscle Mass colt, will carry the Ontario colours in the sophomore trotting colt division. He was third in his elimination.
OSS Super Final and Jugette champ LA Delight represents Ontario in the 3pf final where she’s drawn post eight with John Campbell set to take the lines for his friend Bob McIntosh.
Another Bettors Delight offspring, Betting Line, should have been the favourite in the glamour boy division but he was scratch due to a suspected insect bite.
Mach Three's son, Somebeachsomewhere, has a total of 19 starters among the four pacing finals.
By Heather MacKay.
Lisa Photo.
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