The Free
For All pacers have taken turns beating each other for the majority of the meet
thus far at The Meadowlands. That trend continued on Saturday night in
the form of Doctor Butch.
Sent off as the 4-1 third choice, Doctor Butch settled
mid-pack and off the pace that was established early on by last weeks winner,
Dapper Dude. After tripping the opening quarter in 26-seconds, John
Campbell elected to yield the lead with Dapper Dude to the oncoming Warrawee
Needy, who moved to the front, hitting the half-mile in 54-seconds. At this
point, the outer-flow began to develop, led by the gritty Wake Up Peter who
committed first over. Warrawee Needy went past three-quarters in 1:21.3,
beginning to feel the pressure of the 9/5 favorite, Wake Up Peter who put a
head in front in the stretch, but Doctor Butch was hot on his heels track his
cover from second over and he was able to wear down the favorite while holding
off the late charge of Beach Memories, who had been tracking Doctor Butch
throughout to complete the mile in 1:49, which established a new lifetime mark
for the son of Art Major. The win marked the second on the card for Linda
Toscano and the third for Tim Tetrick at that point, but he wasnt done yet.
Doctor Butch is owned by Kenneth Jacobs.
The eighth race $20,000 B-1 Pace was captured by a
revitalized Odds On Equuleus. Aggressively moving to the lead after a
28.3 tepid opening quarter, Odds On Equuleus asserted himself on the lead and
would carry the field through middle fractions of 56.3 and 1:24 before turning
for home in front. With Long Live Rock on his back, Tim Tetrick asked the
classy five year old for speed and Odds On Equuleus responded and maintained
his one length advantage through the stretch to score in 1:51.1. Odds On
Equuleus is trained by Tony Alagna, giving him a training double and is owned
by Odds On Racing. The win marked the fourth on the card for Tim Tetrick.
The sixth race, a $20,000 B-2/B-1 Handicap Pace saw Al's
Hammered rally from far off the pace to score a bounce-back win in 1:51,
splashing home in a powerful 26.4 seconds. Al's Hammered was coming off a
season that saw him win 15 of 29 starts and he makes his first start of 2015 a
winning one. The six year old Peter Tritton trainee was guided to victory
by Ron Pierce for Harry von Knoblauch.
There were no winning tickets in the fifth race Jackpot
Super Hi-5. The carryover into the Thursday program stands at
$10,645.77. The thirtheenth race jackpot went unclaimed and the carryover
for race 13 on Thursday is $28,076.98. Post time for Thursday night is
7:15 P.M. and features the first round of The Super Bowl trotting series.
