by Brian J. Mazurek, for Buffalo Raceway

Hamburg, NY — Home sweet home.

That’s the way Lutetium has to be feeling after returning to Buffalo Raceway Wednesday evening (April 15) and strolling to an easy 6-1/4 length victory in the $8,500 conditioned trot.

Talk about loving home cooking. Lutetium has nine wins in 19 starts with $59,532 in earnings at Buffalo Raceway since the beginning of 2014. He has won 19 times in 38 tries overall in that span.

After scoring a win at Northville Downs and taking a parked fourth place at Northfield Park in Open trots the past two weeks, Lutetium ($3.20) took no prisoners on his home turf. Getting to the top with ease from the six hole, Lutetium put up splits of 28.3, 57.4 and 1:27.

The last quarter mile was a throttled down 29.4 as Lutetium (Kevin Cummings) had the remaining field of seven waving the white flag in surrender, stopping the timer in a seasonal best of 1:56.4 over the fast track. Justgottogetthere (Jim McNeight) finished in second place while Flaming Yankee (Shawn Gray) took third.

Owned by Colleen Girdlestone and trained by Mark Laidlaw, Lutetium has now won three times in eight starts in 2015, earning $19,341. The 8-year-old gelding (Credit Winner-Luby) now has a career bankroll of $295,437.

In the co-featured $8,500 Open II pace for the fillies and mares, She’s A Maniac had some bad luck in the photo finish as she was nosed out at the wire by Fiftyonefifty. But her misfortune turned into a victory a few minutes later as she was awarded the win via disqualification.

It looked like Fiftyonefifty (Cummings) was going to escape with a narrow nose victory as she just managed to get in front of the pace-setting She’s A Maniac (Jim McNeight). The celebration was short-lived as Fiftyonefifty was placed fourth for a euro-rail violation at the top of the stretch.

She’s A Maniac ($7.70) ended up in the winner’s circle while Basic Survival (Jack Flanigen), who finished in third a nose behind, was elevated to second. It’s De Lovely (David McNeight III) was moved up to third.

Owned by North Creek Racing LLC and trained by Jerry Nugent Jr., She’s A Maniac (Rocknroll Hanover-Check And Raise) has now won $14,948 in 2015 and $311,185 in her career.

Real Joy was just that to her backers as Shawn McDonough steered her to a $118.50 victory in the seventh race.

Racing will continue on Friday night with a 12-race program set for 6:35 p.m. at Buffalo Raceway.