It’s been quite a 24 hours for horseman Andrew Harris: the trainer of winners over $16 million sent out None Bettor A, who won the Quillen Memorial at Harrington on Monday in 1:49.4, and then on Tuesday guided the Somebeachsomewhere mare Silver Tail from out of the clouds on Tuesday (Sept. 21) at The Downs at Mohegan Sun Pocono to post his first driving success in 12 years.
In only his second start back since giving up sulky-sitting in favour of training, Harris guided four-year-old pacing mare Silver Tail to a 1:54.3 off-the-pace victory in the seventh race for trainer Sofia Zingale and Graham Grace Stables. The 36-year-old is a threat to post his 1,000th training victory some time in the first half of next year – how many sulky triumphs he’ll have by then we’ll have to wait and see.
The Sportswriter pacer Rhett Seelster and the Explosive Matter trotting mare Perth Angel De Vie both came from out of the pocket to win their gait’s respective $17,000 features on the Tuesday afternoon program.
Rhett Seelster had an unusual journey – bothered by a rough-gaited horse enough to get an “i” before the quarter, then out first-over at the half -- but he was able to get into the two-hole behind Red Power on the far turn when the previous pocket horse backed up. Anthony Napolitano and his horse got a small breather, then came out again and caught Red Power (driven by Anthony’s brother George, who won four races on the day) by a nose while reducing the pacer’s record to 1:50.4. Antonia Storer handles the training of the winner for owner Daniel Maier.
Perth Angel De Vie’s pocket journey was of the more conventional variety: she let right-hand neighbour and favourite Sweet Heart AS get around her early, sat in until the stretch, then used the famed Pocono Pike as the shipper from The Meadows got up by a neck over a tenacious first-over Kazans Power, with Sweet Heart AS having to settle for third. Tom Jackson drove Perth Angel De Vie for trainer Harold Brocklehurst and the partnership of Double R Farms LLC, David Obley and Richard Williams.
(With files from PHHA/Pocono)