East Rutherford, NJ — There was a ton of action from start to finish in Friday night’s (April 16) fifth race at the Meadowlands.

Nine amateur drivers and pacers went to post and before the first quarter was up, there were three different leaders and several horses parked on the outside creating an outer flow early on on the race.

After the dust settled in a lively :27.1 quarter, Northern Rock (Juan Cano) wrangled the lead from Let’s Foal Around (Rob Harmon), but before the half the lead had changed again with Kingofthejungle(Roy Marohn) charging to the top.

The action didn’t stop there as horses were coming three and four wide before the top of the stretch.  As all of this was taking place, a patient John Calabrese, aboard Master Conrad, bided his time and in the top of the stretch, when clearance inside opened up, he pounced on the leader, Watchmeneighneigh (Tony Beltrami), and was able to nab him near the wire to a half-length victory.

Calabrese is having a stellar start to the year with a win tonight and one last week at Freehold aboard a trotter Shoemaker Hanover. The mile was timed in 1:54.3.   Beltrami was able to hold second and Cano, aboard the early leader rounded out the trifecta.

This four-year-old son of the great Somebeachsomewhere is owned and trained by Stacy Chiodo and Chiodo Racing LLC out of NJ. 

The amateur drivers and pacers will be back in action next Friday night at the Big M and the first post is scheduled for 6:20 p.m.