by Mark Ratzky, publicity department, Sacramento Harness Association

Sacramento, CA — Temptation, who has rattled off two straight wins, including a lifetime best performance at most recent asking, and Hard On The Heart, who is getting some class relief for this go-around, square off among a cast of eight in Wednesday’s (April 25) $6,300 headliner at Cal-Expo.

The race is designed for pacers and they are competing with base claiming prices of $25,000 down to $18,000. Coming off those back-to-back scores at this same level, Temptation should be heavily backed at the windows.

The 4-year-old son of Dragon Again goes about his business for Summersby Stable, takes his lessons from Tim Clevenger, and will once again have Tim Maier giving directions. He is eyeing his fourth snapshot on the year from 10 trips to the post.

Temptation was away from the wars from early February until late March after competing in the Jim Dennis Series and needed a couple of efforts before hitting his best stride. He did just that at 5-1 two weeks ago while racing at this same level, as he left for the top, sat a pocket to the drive, then ignited when it counted to prevail by two lengths.

Off the strength of that victory, Temptation was bet down to 2-1 favoritism in last week’s outing and did not disappoint his many backers. He was parked to command at the quarter after leaving from the testing nine post, took complete control of things from that point, and was never threatened while holding a 2-1/2 length advantage on his nearest rival. The 1:52.4 clocking shaved four ticks off his previous mark.

Hard On The Heart was red-tagged two starts back for $31,250 by Tom Perkins and trainer Tom Wine, and was a solid victor that evening. He has made two starts for his new connections, with both of those miles coming at the Cal-bred Open level. He figures to be more at home with this crew and any of his March efforts would make him hard to handle with Luke Plano at the controls.

Hidden Dragon N completed the exacta behind Temptation last week at a nice number and helps make things interesting. The son of Safely Kept is owned by Katherine Bardis, with Bob Johnson as the conditioner, and with Rick Kuebler at the helm. His most recent score came at a softer level back on March 3, where he established a new career standard with the 1:54.3 final time.

Auric Aura and The Dark Side are back in action after dead-heating for the show spot in last week’s clash at this level. The former is reined and trained by Ed Hensley for his wife Jessica, while The Dark Side has Rick Plano doing the driving and training and races for his wife Mary Ann.

Completing the field are Hewitt A, who leaves from the cozy rail slot with Bruce Clarke at the controls; Something New with Gilbert Herrera; and Hanover D G N, who has Jim Lackey giving directions.

An 11-race program is on tap with the feature set as the seventh on the evening.

Thursday night (April 26) finds the very contentious Invitational Trot holding the top spot, with last week’s victress Desperatehousewife taking on the likes of Oatmeister, Phipps and Iverman in that $7,900 contest.

Another round of Sire Stakes action for the 3-year-olds is set this weekend, with the unbeaten trotters Hitchiker and Thunder’s Comet looking very dominating in their divisions, along with the filly pacer Sintillating with her peers. Among the sophomore pacing colts, things are more wide open with Little Box Out and Endofanera accounting for the first two big-money match-ups of the season, while Axelrod will be gunning for some revenge after checking in third last week as part of a heavily-favored entry after posting a big win in the elimination one back.

Wednesday night means Bal-Cal fever

It’s time for another edition of the popular Bal-Cal Pick 4 Challenge, which combines two races (races 10 and 11) at Balmoral Park in Chicago with a pair of contests (races 10 and 11) from Cal-Expo. The $1 wager comes attached with a $25,000 guaranteed pool.

While last week’s return was on the somewhat modest side at $479.00, go back a couple of weeks and there was $3,300 paid to those who correctly forecast the four cross-country winners. Last fall, there were a trio of jackpot payoffs that saw $20,000, $19,000 and $18,000 for each correct $1 docket.

Cal-Expo racing secretary Fred Kuebler and his counterpart at Balmoral, “Doc” Narotsky, do their very best to put up two challenging races in this event, with the hope of coming up with a challenging handicapping puzzle.

“The first thing we do is take the races with the fullest fields,” Kuebler explained. “We have the last six past performance lines for each horse, so we look at them the same way you would look at horses in the program, and then we try to find the most contentious ones. If possible, we want to avoid having a heavy favorite in either race, so there’s a chance for a nice payoff.”

Post time for the first leg of the Bal-Cal Challenge will be at approximately 8:27 p.m. (PDT).

Live racing resumes at Cal-Expo tonight (Wednesday), continuing through Saturday. Post time each night is at 5:35 p.m. (PDT). On Wednesdays, admission is free, plus Cal-Expo offers a complete Lasagna dinner, with salad and bread, for just $2.00.

Cal-Expo now offers guaranteed $10,000 pools on all Pick-4’s!