Homicide Hunter and Call Me Queen Be won the $25,000 Winners Over features over a 'sloppy' track at The Downs at Mohegan Sun Pocono on Sunday (June 4), but the big news continued to be the hot longshot hands of driver Anthony Napolitano, who for the third straight card brought home a $50-plus winner.
Napolitano started his current streak in the last race of last week’s racing, capturing Tuesday’s 14th event with Ideal Fashion at $68. He struck again on Saturday with 11th race bomber Perseverant ($53.80), and the localites who had climbed on the A-Nap bandwagon didn’t have to wait long for their reward on Sunday, as in the first race he rallied Serious Savannah from far back to light up the toteboard at $58.20. Napolitano
now has one-third (five of 15) of the $50-plus winners so far in 2017 at the mountain oval.
Homicide Hunter, the second-fastest trotter ever on a North American five-eighth-mile track by virtue of his resounding 1:50.1 triumph here last year, continued Saturday’s success in the Winners Over ranks for driver George Napolitano Jr. and trainer Chris Oakes. The pair had tallied with Scott Rocks and Split The House the day before, and on Sunday their streak ran to three when the Mr Cantab gelding Homicide Hunter made the lead at the quarter and then drew off to a 1:54.1 triumph in the off going. Homicide Hunter now has a bankroll of $752,163, and he is owned by Crawford Farms Racing.
In the pacing mares Winners Over event, Call Me Queen Be notched her first victory since winning last year’s Breeders Crown Three-Year-Old Filly Pace Championship, with the Somebeachsomewhere mare stopping the timer in 1:53.2 for trainer Ross Croghan and owners Let It Ride Stables Inc. and Dana Parham. Jim Marohn Jr. got the millionaire right to the front despite the outermost post nine, yielded to quarter-mover Regil Elektra, and then went to the Pocono Pike and made up ground into the :55.4 last half, withstanding the relentless first-over charge of Frost Damage Blues by three-quarters of a length.
(PHHA/Pocono)