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Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Cal Expo Saturday Barn Notes


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.

 
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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.