Friday's $35,000 Fillies & Mares Preferred Pace at Woodbine Racetrack featured a thrilling finish as New York Sire Stakes champion Tea Party Princess and Ontario Sires Stakes Super Final winner Waasmula were separated by just a neck at the wire
. When the dust settled it was 3-2 favourite Tea Party Princess and driver Mike Saftic who hung on for the narrow victory for trainer David Menary and owner Brad Gray of Dundas, Ont.
Tea Party Princess' stablemate, Modern Connection (Scott Zeron), fired off the gate from Post 7 in the nine-horse affair landing the lead ahead of Sweet Hedge (Luc Ouellette) while the class-dropping favourite settled into third. Waasmula (Keith Oliver) was parked out to the :26.3 quarter pole, but cleared to command shortly after that marker.
Saftic made his move down the backstretch angling Tea Party Princess off the pylons and the Art Major filly surged to the top as they passed the half-mile marker in :55.
Tea Party Princess continued to lead the field past three-quarters in 1:22.1 and entered the stretch before Waasmula launched her attack. The pocket-pulling filly gave Tea Party Princess a run for her money, but missed the mark by a neck. Tea Party Princess delivered on her pari-mutuel promise in 1:50.4, just one-fifth of a second off her lifetime mark. Modern Connection finished two and a half lengths behind in third. Sweet Hedge and Ardor Locke (Mario Baillargeon) earned the final paycheques finishing over eight lengths back.
Tea Party Princess paid $5 to win. She is now nine-for-19 this year with $418,564 banked.
Earlier on the card, another Sires Stakes champion was in the spotlight as OSS Super Final winner China Pearls converted from the pocket to win her final start of the year in a career-best 1:54.1 with Paul MacDonell in the bike. Slip Into Glide (Mario Baillargeon) finished two and three-quarter lengths behind after carving out fractions of :27.3, :56.1, and 1:24.4. Cleopatre Duharas (Keith Oliver) was third.
China Pearls paid $4.70 to win as the 6-5 favourite. The sophomore daughter of Kadabra, a winner of eight races in 19 starts during her debut season, is trained by Carman Hie for his Carman Hie Stable Inc., Blake Anthony of Millgrove, Ont., J. Peter Kloepfer of Harley, Ont., and Ted Murrell of Sharon, Ont. The lion's share of the $27,000 purse pushed her lifetime earnings over the $500,000 mark.
To view Friday's harness racing results, click on the following link: Friday Results - Woodbine Racetrack.