Shelly Goudreau Elimination Pace heads card
By Mark Ratzky, publicity – Cal Expo Harness
The
Shelly Goudreau Elimination Pace will share the spotlight on Saturday night’s
program at Cal Expo with a pair of Open III events for the pacers.
There
will be 13 races presented under the Watch and Wager LLC banner with a first
post of 6:15 p.m. The action will continue with the trotters and pacers in
action on Sunday evening and a 4:55 post time.
A
field of nine will line up for Shelly Goudreau. From the rail out: K G Cody
from the Sal Wensceslao barn; the Gerry Longo reined-and-trained Midnight
Destroyer; Rascal Flatter from the Marissa Tyler shedrow; the Bob
Johnson-conditioned Wrangler Potogold; Lucky Land for driver/trainer Tim
Clevenger; the Gene Vallandingham-trained Sheer Desire; Ray’s Razor, who takes
his lessons from Edwin Quevedo; the Luke Plano trained and driven Real
Attitude; and Frankthebank for George Reider.
In
the first of the Open III events, racing secretary Robin Schadt had Endeavors
King, BB’s Harley and At Last drawing for the outside three slots, which they
will occupy in that order among the cast of eight.
In
the Open III for the distaffers, Rag Doll, Surprisingly Sweet, Windsun T Bird
and Secret Alibi drew for the outside and leave from slots No. 7 through 10 in
the co-feature.
**********
Beginning
with Saturday’s program, purses at Cal Expo will be raised by 10 percent across
the board.
Ben
Kenney, Cal Expo CFO said, “The purse pool was in good shape coming out of the
last meet, with each live race up 19 percent over the previous season. This
meet is off to a good start and the horsemen deserve this purse increase.”
Race honors
memory of Shelly Goudreau
Saturday
night’s featured Shelly Goudreau Elimination Pace honors the memory of the
outstanding horseman who was tragically killed in 1982 at the age 34.
Goudreau passed away from injuries sustained in a
racing accident at Hollywood Park. He was involved in the accident on August
27, 1982 and suffered severe injuries. Six days later, on September 2, Goudreau
passed away.
Shelly first got his driving license in 1966 at the
age of 18 and soon led all reinsmen at Windsor Raceway for two consecutive
years. It wasn’t long before he ventured to the United States to compete at
several Michigan tracks.
Goudreau made the trek to California in 1977 and
immediately went to the top of the driving colony. While competing at Hollywood
Park and Los Alamitos, he won the most races and earned the most purse monies
on that circuit for two consecutive years.
He came back east to compete at Roosevelt Raceway
and Yonkers Raceway and won many major stakes in New York, including the
$200,000 George Morton Levy Pace in 1979 in track-record time at Roosevelt.
Goudreau drove at the Meadowlands Racetrack and was once again successful. He
competed at the ‘Big M’ against another up-and-coming driver at the time named
John Campbell, as well as a familiar face from home in Ray Remmen.
The 1981 season proved to be Goudreau’s best year.
He competed in both the Hambletonian (with Santa Ana) and the Little Brown Jug
(with Freedom Fella). He won 170 races and earned $2.3 million in purses that
year – gaudy numbers for the then-33-year-old.
During his career, Goudreau was responsible for the
success of such horses as Genghis Khan , Try Scotch, Tijuana Taxi, Apollos Way
, Freedom Fella, Tender Loving Care, and Superman). In his short career he
amassed 2,291 wins and $12,942,265 in purse money. At the time of his death he
was eighth in the North American driver standings.
