by Charlene Sharpe, USTA Web Newsroom Senior Correspondent

Charlene Sharpe

Berlin, MD — Dozens of harness racing fans lined up to meet Hall of Fame driver John Campbell at Ocean Downs Sunday (July 8).

Campbell, who won more than 10,600 races in his four decades on the track, spent Sunday evening signing autographs and having his picture taken in front of the winner’s circle at Ocean Downs. Though tourists made up the bulk of the crowd at the Ocean City area racetrack, a steady line of hardcore harness racing fans kept Campbell busy as the races went off behind him.

“He’s a legend,” said H.R. Banks, one of the first to get in line. “My whole life he’s been the man.”

Campbell, who retired from driving last year and is now president and CEO of the Hambletonian Society, dominated the driving ranks during his years on the racetrack. Fans watched him win a record six Hambletonians as he led North American drivers in earnings 16 times. He was voted into the harness racing Hall of Fame in 1990 at the age of 35.

Charlene Sharpe photo

John Campbell signed autographs for a steady line of fans on Sunday night at Ocean Downs.

Until Sunday, however, he’d never visited Ocean Downs.

“There’s a first time for everything,” said Pete Szymanski, general manager of racing at Ocean Downs.

Szymanski said the meet-and-greet provided fans with the chance to interact with Campbell and at the same time was raising money for a worthwhile cause, as the driver was accompanied by his wife Paula, who was collecting donations for the Standardbred Retirement Foundation.

“We figured it was a good mix,” Szymanski said. “We could give Paula some money for a good cause and John can talk horses. We should have more guys like him.”

Among the fans waiting to get posters signed by Campbell was Annapolis resident Mike Klug. He said he’d been coming to the races at Ocean Downs since he was a toddler and was thrilled to meet Campbell, who he watched drive Ball And Chain in the 1990s.

“He’s always been one of my favorite drivers,” he said.

Campbell, who was in the area for a golf tournament, said he was enjoying his first visit to Ocean Downs and was happy to meet with fans. While the majority of them simply enjoyed watching him win North America’s premier races year after year, Campbell said one fan in particular had surprised him.

“A man went through the line and brought up a horse my dad and I had, a horse I looked after before I could even drive,” Campbell said.

Campbell said the man he met Sunday night had claimed the horse, Jacobie (a foal of 1965), later in his career.

“Nobody has brought up Jacobie in a long time,” Campbell said with a laugh. “You just never know.”

Campbell, a proponent of the new TrackMaster classification system, said he’d also been interested in visiting Ocean Downs to see the rating system in action. Ocean Downs and Hoosier Park have been using the TrackMaster system, which uses software to assign a rating number to each horse, to create races.

“Ocean Downs is one of the first tracks to use the TrackMaster ratings so I wanted to show support for that,” Campbell said.

When asked what feedback he’d received regarding the classification process, Campbell said it had been overwhelmingly positive.

“The potential for this system is much better than what we’re dealing with now,” he said. “The numbers are bearing that out. The management here and at Hoosier are happy with the results.”