This Saturday, the richest event in harness racing will take place at The Meadowlands in New Jersey. The Hambletonian, with a purse of $1,520,333, showcases the best 3 year old trotters in the world. It is the only live nationally televised harness race of the year. Muscle Hill is the heavy favorite in the race, but crazy things can happen in 3 year old trotting events. If looking for a pick that might pay, I’d keep my eye on Federal Flex. Just a hunch.
Oddly enough, my focus won’t be on the Hambletonian or any of the other première $100,000+ events that are being raced on Saturday afternoon. It will be on the race 13, where a field of 10 non winners of 4 races/ $65,000 lifetime 3 and 4 year olds will help fill out a star studded card. I bet you can guess who is in to race…that’s right, In Over My Head. We are racing on Hambo Day! It would be the equivalent of having a horse race at Churchill Downs on Derby Day. We didn’t draw real well (post position #9), but we are reunited with Andy Miller, who will be driving Mo for the first time since the Junior Trendsetter Final back in February.
This is the 83rd installment of the Hambletonian and marks the 45th anniversary of Speedy Rodney racing in the marquee event. As I mentioned before, Speedy was owned by my grandpa Wayne (as well as his brother and another investor). It is hard to imagine what is would be like to have a horse complete in this event. Here we are, 45 years later and Greg, Danny and I are just thrilled to be racing on Hambo Day. Our race is just an afterthought, but it still feels special. You have to have a really good horse to even be able to make that card (and we do), but we are a number of notches below the featured event. It just gives additional perspective on what Grandpa had to be feeling back in 1964. What a memory. Maybe someday we can get there too. Feels like a million miles away now, but as the old saying goes, crazier things have happened.
As you might imagine, I have searched quite a bit over the years to find any sort of story or bit of memorabilia that relates to the 1964 Hambletonian and the fact is there isn’t a ton out there. It was a different media world back then, but I have found a couple of links and a picture to share. The first is more of an official summary from the Hambletonian Society:
http://www.hambletonian.org/archives_hambo/h_1964.html
And one from Sports Illustrated…this is really interesting and I honestly have never read it before I did a search for this entry. Note the ‘Wisconsin owned’ comment in regards to Speedy Rodney and the fact that the owners ‘refused to sell’ Speedy to big money owners out east. I always knew Grandpa could be stubborn!
https://www.si.com/vault/1964/09/14/608358/the-winner-from-the-wrong-side-of-the-barn
Also, here is a picture of the start of the 1964 Hambletonian. As mentioned in the SI article, you can see Speedy Rodney gunning to the front on the far outside…a move that proved to be a bit too aggressive.
Oddly enough, my focus won’t be on the Hambletonian or any of the other première $100,000+ events that are being raced on Saturday afternoon. It will be on the race 13, where a field of 10 non winners of 4 races/ $65,000 lifetime 3 and 4 year olds will help fill out a star studded card. I bet you can guess who is in to race…that’s right, In Over My Head. We are racing on Hambo Day! It would be the equivalent of having a horse race at Churchill Downs on Derby Day. We didn’t draw real well (post position #9), but we are reunited with Andy Miller, who will be driving Mo for the first time since the Junior Trendsetter Final back in February.
This is the 83rd installment of the Hambletonian and marks the 45th anniversary of Speedy Rodney racing in the marquee event. As I mentioned before, Speedy was owned by my grandpa Wayne (as well as his brother and another investor). It is hard to imagine what is would be like to have a horse complete in this event. Here we are, 45 years later and Greg, Danny and I are just thrilled to be racing on Hambo Day. Our race is just an afterthought, but it still feels special. You have to have a really good horse to even be able to make that card (and we do), but we are a number of notches below the featured event. It just gives additional perspective on what Grandpa had to be feeling back in 1964. What a memory. Maybe someday we can get there too. Feels like a million miles away now, but as the old saying goes, crazier things have happened.
As you might imagine, I have searched quite a bit over the years to find any sort of story or bit of memorabilia that relates to the 1964 Hambletonian and the fact is there isn’t a ton out there. It was a different media world back then, but I have found a couple of links and a picture to share. The first is more of an official summary from the Hambletonian Society:
http://www.hambletonian.org/archives_hambo/h_1964.html
And one from Sports Illustrated…this is really interesting and I honestly have never read it before I did a search for this entry. Note the ‘Wisconsin owned’ comment in regards to Speedy Rodney and the fact that the owners ‘refused to sell’ Speedy to big money owners out east. I always knew Grandpa could be stubborn!
https://www.si.com/vault/1964/09/14/608358/the-winner-from-the-wrong-side-of-the-barn
Also, here is a picture of the start of the 1964 Hambletonian. As mentioned in the SI article, you can see Speedy Rodney gunning to the front on the far outside…a move that proved to be a bit too aggressive.
At the end of the day, the Hambletonian was a disappointment for Speedy Rodney and his connections, but he lived to race another day. He was actually at his best as a 4 and 5 year old and provided a lifetime of memories for Grandpa, his brother (co owner) as well as Greg who would have been about 10 years old.With that in mind, it is kind of a good time to reflect on where we have been and hopefully where we are going with our own horse. The season started with an endless amount of promise: a 2nd place finish in the sire series followed by a 2nd and a 1st at Pocono Downs. Next came the 5th place finish in the 2nd leg of the sire series, which was disappointing, but not the end of the world. Unfortunately, that was followed by the trainwreck in the 3rd leg of the sires series that made us modify our plans for the rest of the season. That’s the way it goes. Strikes and gutters. I feel like we are on a bit of an uptick now…maybe that’s wishful thinking, but I know we still have a horse who in reality has yet to put together his best race. I want to see that race. I really think it will be impressive and will pull us out of our current state of mind and back to a level of ownership bliss (even if the stay there is temporary).
The next three races will provide In Over My Head his chance to show everyone what he can do. Starting with the Saturday race at the Meadowlands and followed by a trip back to Illinois to race at Springfield and DuQuoin. The races will go for $22,500, $30,000 and $40,000. Nice purses and races that he has the ability to win. Big performances can go a long way in setting us up for the rest of the season.
To compare our current spot right now to a normal sports team, we are kind of in the meat of the season. Preseason expectations don’t matter anymore. They feel a long ways away now. The first part of the season was filled with some wins and some losses. It kind of feels like we have a 5-3 record (if this was the NFL), which is good, but for some reason we should be 6-2. One more win doesn’t look like much on paper, but has a very different feel to it. We are happy, but not ecstatic. We left a big win on the field by dropping a game winning touchdown against the first place team back in the 3rd leg of the sire series and it still stings a bit. Stings can subside, though and the only way to do it is go out and race better.
What this stretch could (and hopefully will) do is set us up for a chance at the ‘playoffs’ at the end of the season. I don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves (go 1-0 every week, right…how many coaches have said that to you…guessing about every one), but we have a chance to race in a couple of grade A events in November, but nothing is guarantied. The next 3 races should give us a good idea where we will end up. More to come!
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