One of the best sophomore pacers in the country, All Bets
Off, from the powerful Ron Burke Stable, will be the featured attraction when
Monticello Raceway presents the last preliminary leg of the rich New York Sire
Stakes program on Tuesday afternoon, August 26.
All Bets Off, owner of a 1:48.2 record, is currently fourth
on the list of money winning 3 year old colt pacers this year with over
$511,000 in earnings. The son of Bettor’s Delight-Armbro Penelope has seven
wins, two seconds and one third in 10 starts this year and he comes into his
$38,500 split off three consecutive victories the last in 1:50.3 in
the Carl Millstein Final at Northfield Park on August 15.
Owned by Burke Racing, Frank Baldachino, The Panhellenic
Stable and Rosemary Shelswell, Burke has once again assigned the driving duties
to Matt Kakaley when All Bets Off starts from post five in the first race
on the card.
In all, Burke will send out six sophomore pacers that
afternoon, four in the three NYSS splits while two others will race in the
Excelsior Stakes. That means the Burke Stable will have an entry in one of the
NYSS events and it so happens that it will be in the event that All Bets Off is
in.
Joining him on the mutuel ticket will be stablemate Forty
Five Red, to be driven by Mark MacDonald, another nice colt but not the caliber
of All Bets Off. It appears that Burke is probably starting All Bets Off in the
sire stakes to make sure he has a enough points to qualify for the $225,000
Final at Yonkers Raceway on September 13.
In the second NYSS division, race four, the Jimmy
Takter-trained Capital Account gets the odds maker’s nod as the early favorite
from the pole position. A winner of almost $105,000 this year the American
Ideal-Copywriter colt, owned by Brittany Farms owns a record of 1:51 taken
earlier this year at the Meadowlands.
Brett Miller will be in the pilot’s seat when Capital
Account leaves from post position one.
Another Brittany Farms pacer, Winds Of Change, whom they
co-own with Val D’Or Farms, is rated the favorite in the third NYSS split, race
eight on the card. Trained by Linda Toscano the son of American Ideal-Art’s
Temptress, has won two of his last three starts at Tioga Downs the fastest in
1:50.2.
Winds Of Change will leave from the four hole with Brett
Miler at the controls.
The undercard features four Excelsior Series paces which
will go as races two, five, six and seven on the 11- race card. Arguably,
the best of the starters in those events is Lauren and Bob Tucker’s
Believeinthespirit, an Art Major gelding out of Spirit Of the West, who is a
five-time winner thus far this year with over $41,000 in earnings.
Trainer Ed Lohmeyer, has assigned Jimmy Morrill, Jr. to do
the driving when the pacer leaves from post five in the second race on the
card.
