by John Siscos, WEG communications

Toronto, ON — Sweet Lou is the world’s fastest 2-year-old colt pacer after setting a world record of 1:49 in the $650,000 Breeders Crown Colt Pace final on Saturday night (Oct. 29) at Woodbine Racetrack.

USTA/Mark Hall photo

Sweet Lou set a world record of 1:49 in the Breeders Crown 2-year-old colt pace.

Taking command before the three-quarters in 1:21.4, the Ron Burke-trained Sweet Lou sat behind fractions of :26.1 and :54.3.

With driver Dave Palone in the bike, the 6-5 favorite extended his lead in the stretch to capture the Crown final by 7-1/2 lengths. A Rocknroll Dance (Randy Waples) finished second and Hurrikane Kingcole (Luc Ouellette) was third.

The son of Yankee Cruiser-Sweet Future, who won his elimination, now has a lifetime record of 10-2-0 in 12 starts and career earnings of C$688,117 for Pennsylvania’s Burke Racing Stable LLC, Weaver Bruscemi LLC, Lawrence Karr and Phillip Collura.

Sweet Lou paid $4.50 to win.

“He’s just super intelligent,” said Palone. “He just loves to do his work, he doesn’t act like a baby at all.

“He was so much the best in the sire stakes, that I just wasn’t taking any chances. I think that he turned the corner in Lexington and Ronny will probably agree. We got him down there and got him to work over the big track and got him settled to race from behind.

“He came into the elimination from racing off the helmet. So I just thought I had the strongest horse going in. The race actually set up perfect, I could never have dreamt of a better set-up really. He got away pretty alert and Randy conceded with A Rocknroll Dance, which put me in a great spot. I thought I could either wait for Luc or move him back to the front when the breaks come. It actually worked out.

“This horse just came up so good tonight, but I don’t think it would have mattered.”

“We’ve been high on this colt all year,” said co-owner Mark Weaver. “To say (1):49, no, but it’s pretty special. I’m usually a claiming guy; $10,000, $20,000 claimers. I always said winning that was just as good as winning a stakes race, but after this I think I was wrong. This is pretty sweet. I wasn’t very nervous. I was just looking at the timer and hoping he could put a good mark on. I just wanted him to get to the wire. This is my first Breeders Crown. It’s as big as it gets.”

Co-owner Lawrence Karr added: “This is why you’re in harness racing. This is the pinnacle. We’ve had a lot of nice horses before, but never a colt like this. This is really our dream. I haven’t slept for about a week leading up to this race. I was thinking about it every night, even though I have no impact on the race. We love Yankee Cruiser as a sire. We looked at every single Yankee Cruiser in the sale. This was by far the best bred horse by Yankee Cruiser and Ron loved him physically. He’s more than fulfilled our expectations.”