Aaron Merriman bounced back on Tuesday (Dec. 8) from the horrible luck he had the first two days of the week, winning twice at both The Meadows and Northfield to cut George Napolitano Jr.’s lead in the 2015 North American dashwinning derby to three, with the score now Napolitano-819, Merriman-816.

Again, Merriman did not enjoy sitting behind well-regarded horseflesh during his 23-mount day Tuesday — he had the favorite only twice, and he won with both of them, once at each track. At Northfield, his other win came with a 6-1 shot.

Ron Wrenn Jr., two-time defending driver dash king, continued with his hot hands, taking four events during the Tuesday Northfield action. He now has 25 wins during six December cards at the Cleveland oval, and 38 over his last nine sessions there. But even though Wrenn won more than 100 races in December to take the 2014 title, his current yearly figure of 748 seems to present too much of a hole to overcome this late in the year — especially since Merriman himself had 93 wins in November, 69 at Northfield.

Wrenn has 605 winners for the year at the Northfield twice around, and Merriman 533.

Napolitano is back in action Wednesday afternoon at Harrah’s Philadelphia, the first of four cards during the final week of the 2015 season at the suburban Philadelphia track (after which he says he will end his driving year), while Merriman has doubleheader action planned for Wednesday and Friday this week.