from Harrah’s Chester

Chester, PA — After driving Roll With Joe to a thrilling nose victory in the Battle of the Brandywine at Harrah’s Chester in August, Ron Pierce ran from the winner’s circle to the drivers’ room, changed clothes, then raced to get to Newark (NJ) Airport, where he was to catch a plane to get married in Sweden in two days.

And if “Chester” and “2011” weren’t already linked in Pierce’s mind, the connection was reinforced Sunday (Dec. 18), when Pierce (interestingly, the only current Hall of Famer in the field) defeated a powerpacked group of superior sulkysitters in the $50,000 Harrah’s Chester Driving Challenge at the suburban Philly oval.

Pierce took his advantage when he could, winning with three of his drives at 2-1, 2-1, and 3-1 odds, while the other five went off over 6-1, four at 14-1 or more. Under the 50-25-12-8-5-4-3-2 (10 for scratch) scoring system in the octet of championship races, Pierce tallied 189.5 points (including a dead heat fourth, worth 6.5 points) to defeat George Napolitano, Jr., the only other driver to double in the tourney and an amasser of 149 points.

Third was Chester’s leading driver, Tim Tetrick, followed by Daniel Dube, Andy Miller, David Miller, Corey Callahan and Yannick Gingras.

Luck–bad luck hurt some of the participants: Gingras, for example, had a scratch and four horses 30-1 or more among his charges.

Pierce won $15,000 of the $50,000 in prize money put up for the Challenge, but perhaps even bigger winners were Operation Warm, a charity which provides winter coats to disadvantaged children. The drivers generously donated 10 percent of their take for the day ($5,000) to Operation Warm, while Standardbred owner Peter Grandich matched that contribution.

Today starts the last three days of the 2011 Harrah’s Chester meeting, with post times on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday at 12:40 p.m.