Consolation action goes today
The Weekend Of Champions begins today at Red Shores at the Charlottetown Driving Park featuring 11 dashes, including the Atlantic Breeders Crown consolations for two- and threeyear-old pacers.
The card starts at 12:30 p.m. with the $5,000 consolations in Races 4, 6, 8 and 10 featuring the top performers of the Atlantic Sires Stakes season who did not make the top eight spots for Sunday’s finals. Mick Dundee has shown on numerous occasions he can tussle with the top colts and that earns him the status as morning line favourite in the Race 10 three-year-old pacing colt consolation. Don MacNeill of Charlottetown owns, trains and drives the son of Aahm Canadian Now with him leaving from Post 5.
Shesaroyal Cowgirl is top choice in the Race 8 three-yearold pacing filly consolation for trainer-driver Mark Bradley and owner William Andrew of Calgary.
The first crop of Image Of Dawn has been well represented by JJ Powerball, who is the early favourite in the Race 6 two-yearold pacing colt consolation for trainer Austin Sorrie and owners Walter Simmons of Summerside and Tammy Collings of Hazel Brook. Leading driver Marc Campbell picks up the drive on the three-time winner as regular driver Gordie Hennessey elected to drive fellow Sorrie-trainee Dustylanesam off the rail.
Woodmere Saphire has Post 4 in the Race 4 two-year-old filly consolation. Gilles Barrieau drives the daughter of Articulator for trainer Jackie Matheson and New Brunswick owners Thomas McGuffog and Bruce MacDonald and Geoffrey Macneish.
Today will also see a sold-out banquet, presented by the P.E.I. Standardbred Horse Owners Association, starting at 7 p.m. in the Top of the Park restaurant. The event will celebrate the achievements of several stars of the Atlantic Canadian breeding industry and four Atlantic Canadian racing families will be honoured.
They are the Steve Mahar family of New Brunswick, the Sheppard family from Newfoundland and Labrador, the Polley family of Amherst, N.S., and the MacDonald family from Charlottetown. The MacDonalds lived a block from the Charlottetown Driving Park since the late 1960s, and brothers Mike and Paul have provide many memorable moments on the nearby racetrack and beyond.