by John Berry, for the FSBOA

Pompano Beach, FL — In an era where Brian Sears gets many of the headlines, father Jay Sears proved that, at 76 years of age, he can still compete with the best of them.

The elder Sears won two of the four non-wagering FSBOA sponsored Sunshine State Stakes events for 2-year-olds at Pompano Park on Sunday night (Oct. 15) while finishing third in the other two events.

Sears was in the winner’s circle right off the bat as he guided Jennifer, a daughter of Proud Bushy, to her maiden win in 2:09.1 after leading every step of the mile and holding on for dear life at the end to hold off the previously undefeated I Rhoda Daley (Jason MacDougall) by a nose. Ms Katie B (Gary Braden) was third.

Co-owned by Jay along with trainer-wife Kim, Jennifer had a pair of seconds and a third prior to the maiden win on Sunday night.

Said Sears after the win, “She’s named after my daughter, so it was especially nice to win with her. I kind of gunned her out of there early and she opened up a pretty sizable lead and then trotted a decent final quarter to hold on.”

Sears also won with the pacing filly Diamond Eyes, a daughter of Six Of Diamonds. Trained by Kim Sears for owner Penny Kelley, Diamond Eyes found a good early spot in the garden seat as Six Line Lily (Wally Hennessey) set up early panels of :31.1 and 1:02.3. Heading into the final bend, Diamond Eyes went on the attack to engage in a war with the pair at the third station in 1:32.4 as these two slugged it out until the 16th pole when Starcasim (Joe Sanzeri) joined the fray. At the wire, Diamond Eyes proved the winner by a neck over Starcasim with Six Line Lily next in 2:03.2.

It was also the maiden win for Diamond Eyes in her career measuring three starts, prompting Sears to remark, “She’s getting better now but we’ve got some deep competition in that division, including another one I own, Krinda, who mad a break early on.”

Krinda has two wins in four starts, including her miscue, with a mark of 1:58.2.

“Mike (trainer Deters) has a serious filly in there, too, Prairie Easter,” said Sears, “with a (1):58.2 mark and she was scratched so we were kind of lucky here to win. A little luck never hurts in this business.”

Sears has a .431 UDR with a 4-3-6 scorecard in 16 starts thus far in the young Pompano Park stakes season.

The other two Sunshine State Stakes events were won by Dangerous Mood and Silver Wings.

Dangerous Mood, a 2-year-old gelded son of Proud Bushy, kept his record unblemished for Wally Hennessey as he scored his third straight win — this time in 2:03.4. Trained by Jim McDonald for the Smiley Farm, Dangerous Mood has never relinquished the top spot in any of his three performances thus far in his career.

“So far, so good,” replied trainer McDonald. “So we’re just hoping he keeps going. His first winning mile (2:02.3) was quite a surprise and his second win (2:01.1) was terrific. He seems to have good manners and, along with speed, is a good combination. Just hoping he keeps improving as we go forward.”

Dangerous Mood won by four lengths over Prairie Eclipse (Jim Meittinis) with Brian (Jay Sears) next.

Silver Wings, a son of Rock On, looked very impressive in scoring a wire-to-wire win for Corey Braden in 1:59.4 — :58.3–:29. Trained by Veral Bowman, who co-owns with Craig Schmidt, Silver Wings carved out panels of :30, 1:01.1 and 1:30.4 along the way to score by 7-1/4 lengths over Mister Special T (Rob Hoffman) with Jay Jay (Sears) third.

Sunshine State Stakes action continues on Wednesday night with four non-wagering events for the 3-year-olds. Post time for the early events is 5:30 p.m. with the pari-mutuel program scheduled to get underway at 7:20 p.m.