BY
FRANK DRUCKER, Publicity Director, Empire City @ Yonkers Raceway
YONKERS, NY,
Thursday, June 27, 2019—The Empire’s glamour gentlemen sauntered into Yonkers
Raceway Thursday evening (June 27th), doing so for the $167,500 New
York Sire Stakes Armand Palatucci Pace for 3-year-old colts and geldings.
A pair of
equally-parsed $83,750 portions went postward, starting with a track record.
Polester American
Mercury (Tyler Buter, $5) stuffed 4-5 favorite Hickfromfrenchlick (Mark
MacDonald) back from whence he came…the three-hole.
From there, he
drilled ‘em (:26.4; 55.3; 1:23.2;
1:50.3), disposing of pocket-sitting Major March (Jason Bartlett) by a couple
of lengths. Hickfromfrenchlick wound up a first-up, non-threatening third.
Buddy Hill (Brian Sears) was fourth.
For second choice
American Mercury, a American Ideal gelding co-owned by Crawford Farms &
Northfork Racing, Chuck Pompey & Scott Bice and trained by Chris Oakes, it
was his fourth win in six seasonal starts. The exacta paid $25, the triple
returned $36.20 and the superfecta paid $76.
The life-best
effort was also a new track record for his weight class and matched the fastest
local mile of the season.
“At the head of
the lane, he was loaded,” Buter said. “I can’t say much I appreciate getting to
drive him.”
The evening’s
second and final statebred event saw favored Rollwithpapajoe (Joe Bongiorno,
$4.60) yield to Stone Hanover (Jim Morrill Jr.) before the pole-sitting retook.
He did the rest (:28.3, :57.4,
1:25.2, 1:52.3), the :54.4 back half more than sufficient to whip ‘Stone’ by a
length-and-three-quarters.
Major Joe Lindy (Scott Zeron) was third, with Artie’s Ideal
(Marcus Miller) fourth.
For ‘Papajoe,’ a
Roll with Joe gelding co-owned by Barbara Bongiorno Stable, Bill Lambos &
Dionisios Liberatos and trained by Jennifer Bongiorno, it was his third win in
10 ‘ 19 starts. The exacta paid $22, the triple returned $304.50 and the
superfecta paid $911.
“My horse can make
speed, and when no one left early against him, I knew he’d be tough,” driver
Bongiorno said.
New York Sire
Stakes returns downstate Friday night (June 28th), with the $167,500
Mike Cohen Pace for 3-year-old fillies.
Total purses for
the 2019 New York-bred program are estimated at $14 million. For more
information, please visit www.nysirestakes.com.
As an unrelated
aside, Thursday’\s Pick 5 wager, which began with a $7,500 carryover and a
$20,000 guaranteed pool, saw $33,602 of new coin. Into an after-takeout pool of
approximately $32,701, the winning combination of 2/5/4/1/4 paid $1,107.75 for
each correct half-a-buck ticket.
