By Mark Ratzky, publicity – Cal Expo Harness
Track record holder Pridecrest, fresh from a dominating victory over a sloppy track in the Joe Lighthill Memorial last weekend, heads the cast in Friday night’s featured $8,250 Open Trot.
There will be a 10-race card presented by Watch and Wager LLC with a first post of 6:45 p.m. and the program will also feature the $5,000 Funicello/Holt Prep for the pacing fillies and mares which has brought out a full and very contentious field of 10.
Pridecrest is a 10-year-old son of Angus Hall who races for Chris Schick, takes his lessons from Kathie Plested and will once again have the services of Mooney Svendsen.
He comes into this contest with 54 wins from his 221 starts, $490,000 in earnings and a 1:53 2/5 mark that stands as the course standard.
Sent off the slight 3-2 choice in the Lighthill, Pridecrest dropped into an early stalking position, came out to attack to the final bend and streaked home for Svendsen while posting a three and a quarter-length decision.
Rock Party was his most immediate victim in that affair and will look to reverse that finish for Chupp Racing Stable, trainer Bob Johnson and pilot Luke Plano. He was hard used when first-over last week and figures to be much tighter for Friday’s main event.
Completing the field are Silverhill Volo for Chip Lackey; Mandeville for Gerry Longo; the Nathalie Tremblay-trained Swan County and Pridecrest’s stablemate Daytona Dreamin.
A Major Omen pulls off
a theft
A Major Omen literally stole last weekend’s Dave Goldschmidt Memorial Pace and his accomplice was his 77-year-old owner/driver/trainer Gerry Longo.
Able to get away with a clear lead in :31 2/5 and 1:02 1/5 over the track listed as good, Longo and A Major Omen came the back half in a tick under :57 to secure the score by a head over the pocket-sitting Albergo Hanover.
Longo, who went over the 3,000-win mark as a driver here back in January, is now sitting on 999 as a trainer and continues to show that age is just a number for the man with familiar green, black and gold colors.
Gerry was introduced to the game by Larry Gregory as a teenager which led him to the backstretch at Batavia Downs in New York after his graduation from high school.
“It was about two years later that I started driving,” Longo recalled. “My first winner was in 1966 at the Tiffen Fair in Ohio and one of my best years was in 1972 when I set a couple of world records and beat Joe O’Brien for the driving title at Hollywood Park.”
As for A Major Omen, his Goldschmidt score was his 31st from 111 lifetime trips to the post and pushed his bankroll over the $311,000 mark with a 1:49 2/5 mark that was established two years ago at the The Meadowlands.
