by David Mattia, USTA Web Newsroom Senior Correspondent

New Brunswick, NJ — In the harness racing world, the name Hanover is synonymous with equine accomplishment, and this season there’s a big horse coming down the road who, after only 15 starts, is rapidly becoming quite accomplished. His name is Sutter Hanover and he’s a son of Hanover Shoe Farm’s superb stallion Dragon Again.

Dragon Again, a brown son of the immortal Dragon’s Lair, is already the sire of two-time Breeders Crown winner My Little Dragon, but Sutter Hanover might be looking to muscle his way to the top of the family tree when he goes postward Saturday night in the $1.4 million Pepsi North America Cup at Mohawk Racetrack.

Last Saturday night saw Sutter Hanover bear the heaviest load of the pari-mutuel monies, and reward his band of backers by easily winning his $47,000 elimination of the North America Cup. He moved easily by the leaders passing the half-mile marker and skipped away by 1-1/4 lengths in 1:50.4 for driver David Miller and trainer Mark Harder.

“I like to see him come from off the pace,” said co-owner Tom Pontone. “Sometimes he loses his focus when he’s on the front end.”

New Image Media photo

David Miller steered Sutter Hanover to a 1:50.1 score in a Burlington division.

It’s hard to imagine Sutter Hanover losing focus on the front end or anywhere for that matter because, prior to last week’s elimination win, he quarter-poled and then flattened a field in a $94,000 Burlington division at Mohawk. If anything, he was very focused — focused on winning by 5–3/4 lengths in 1:50.1, with a last quarter in :27.2.

“I really liked him in the Burlington,” recalled Pontone. “That was two races ago and he looked really good, but you don’t like to see them on the front end all the time.”

Sutter Hanover was $20,000 yearling purchase at Harrisburg and he is owned by Deena Frost, Sampson Street Stables, Fox Hollow Farm and T L P Stable (Tom and Louis Pontone). His dam Sami Cam (No Nukes) has produced a couple of fast record horses, but Sutter Hanover is hands down the best of her foals thus far.

Tom Pontone and his father Louis are New Jersey businessmen and savvy horse owners whose victories are too numerous to mention, but names like Red Bow Tie, Art Major, Strong Yankee and Shark Gesture account for the six Breeders Crown victories they’ve won under the name T L P Stable. Sutter Hanover is apt to be the seventh, but he has a long season ahead of him and a lot of good horses to beat.

“This is the most competitive (North America Cup) field I’ve seen in a long time,” said Pontone. “Usually you have a few standouts, but any of these horses can win. This field is very evenly matched. There’s Kenneth J who’s a really good horse to think about because he got roughed up in the elimination — and it’s a tough field.”

His more recent winning ways notwithstanding, Sutter Hanover started out his career somewhat unnoticeably. His fourth pari-mutuel race was a Champlain Stakes division at Mohawk where he finished a well-beaten seventh, but after that he was entered in two overnight events and scored back-to-back victories for driver Rick Zeron.

“Early in his 2-year-old season he was never really 100 percent for us,” recalled Pontone. “He’d been sick on and off — nothing major but just enough to hold him back.”

Despite being on-and-off sick, Sutter Hanover rallied toward the end of his freshman season with a 1:50.4 win in his Breeders Crown elimination where he was relegated to the realm of longshot-land, but at odds of over 22-1 he easily overtook the highly regarded Kenneth J and Charley Barley.

The sturdy son of Dragon Again followed that elimination victory with a fourth place finish in the $600,000 final. Most owners would have been discouraged, but Pontone saw something in his horse’s performance that might have gone unnoticed by a casual observer, or worse yet, an impatient owner.

“He was great in the Breeders Crown,” said Pontone. “He pretty much closed from last. At the three-quarters he was far back and he kept coming; he only got beat a few lengths and after that he started to show his full ability.”

After the Breeders Crown, Sutter Hanover was sent to The Meadowlands where tried to front-end his opponents in an elimination of The Governor’s Cup, but he was caught on the wire by Always A Virgin. That second place finish, however, earned him a spot in the $450,000 final and a place in the record books.

Pontone proudly remembers that night at The Meadowlands when his colt won The Governor’s Cup after taking a rather long route.

“In the Governor’s Cup he was on cruise control and he never saw the rail until after the three-quarters. He ran that race on his own and when he cleared the lead he was strong.”

Calling him “strong” might be a bit of an understatement especially because Sutter Hanover overcame a very complicated trip on a cold night (38 degrees). Through the stretch, and in spite of it all, he was still looking to increase his 3–1/4 length lead when he mercifully tripped the teletimer in 1:52.

Sutter Hanover started off his sophomore campaign on May 3, in a qualifier where he finished a well-beaten eighth, but Pontone, being the intuitive guy he is, knew that this was not a bad thing.

“His last quarter was :26.4. I was happy with that qualifier because we were trying to teach him to race from behind and that’s what he did. He finished the race strong and came back in the next qualifier and won that in (1):52.1 with another :26.4 last quarter.”

Sutter Hanover’s first pari-mutuel start as a sophomore was a 1:51.2 crush-kill-destroy at The Meadows in a $19,886 Pennsylvania Sires Stake race. After that came the aforementioned Burlington and the North America Cup elimination.

Aside from hoping for a win Saturday night, Pontone sees a bright future ahead for Sutter Hanover.

“He started off a little slow but I’d rather see a horse come on strong at the end of the year than see one start off good and then tail off. This horse keeps getting better. He’s staked this year and eligible to just about everything.”

The Pepsi North America Cup will be an interesting race to watch not only because it’s a highly competitive field, but also because it will showcase much of the bright 3-year-old pacing talent we’ll be following for the rest of the year.