By Mark Ratzky, publicity – Cal Expo Harness
Life Isa Shortwalk, a sharp
6-1 upsetter last week, figures to get a lot more respect at the windows in
Sunday night’s $15,000 Bill Vallandingham Pace for fillies and mares.
The Vallandingham headlines a
nine-race Watch and Wager LLC card that is set to get underway at 5 p.m.
Life Isa Shortwalk is an
8-year-old daughter of Keystone Rodeo who carries the banner of Set The Pace
Racing LLC and is reined and trained by Nick Roland. She comes into this
assignment just shy of the $200,000 earnings mark with a 1:52 4/5 standard that
was set at Plainridge Racecourse.
Leaving from the No. 2 post
last week, she was unhurried early and then came second-over down the backside.
Roland made a sweeping move with his mare off the final turn to grab command
and she went on to a two and a quarter-length decision while stopping the timer
n 1:55 3/5.
Casa Mia put in a solid late
bid to complete the exacta in that affair for owner Gretchen Smith, trainer
Nathalie Tremblay and pilot James Kennedy and will be looking to turn the
tables on Sunday.
The 9-year-old Driven To Win
mare has clicked in six of her 30 trips to the post this season, with the most
recent snapshot coming in mid-September over the Hawthorne course. Her 1:53 2/5
lifetime mark came three years ago over a sloppy track at the Meadowlands.
Taking them on in the
Vallandingham are Wizzel Stix, Brooklyn Moonshine, Helen’s Girl, Machet Time
and Shes A Live Wire.
Races honor memory of
Arnstine, Vallandingham
This week’s feature races are
named for Bill Vallandingham and Donald Arnstine, who both had a major impact
on harness racing in California.
Bill Vallandingham passed
away earlier this year at age 74 due to complications from a lung transplant
performed in 2014, while Donald Arnstine passed away in September of last year
at the age of 85.
“Billy V”, as Vallandingham
was affectionately known, was the starter here at Cal Expo for 20 years before
health issues forced him to leave the job seven years ago, but he did return to
limited duties in 2018.
He wore many hats around the
racetrack, including groom, paddock judge, horse identifier and horse tattooer
before assuming his stint as the starter in 1994. Bill Vallandingham was a
veteran of the Army who served in Vietnam.
Donald Arnstine was a
longtime owner and industry activist who along with his wife Barbara campaigned
harness horses in California for five decades. They claimed their first horse,
Big Time, in 1973 with the Desomer Stable and over the years they had many
stars with that barn, including Quaker Byrd.
During the late 1970s and
early 1980s, Arnstine was active in the Western Standardbred Association, now
known as the California Harness Horsemen’s Association.
He served as president of the
organization in 1978, overseeing the legislation that created the state’s sire
stakes program and he also helped negotiate horsemen’s agreements with Los
Alamitos, Hollywood Park, Bay Meadows and Cal Expo.
While Donald Arnstine had a
full and successful life in academia, including a long and accomplished
university teaching career and author, his passion was always his wife of 56
years, his children, his grandchildren and harness racing.
