by PHHA/Pocono
Wilkes-Barre, PA — Developing 3- and 4-year-old trotters and pacers will be looking to confirm spots in their respective $30,000 Championships of the Bobby Weiss Series this coming week at Pocono, with pacers featured on the Monday (April 24) card and trotters taking the track on Tuesday (April 25).
The fourth and final preliminary round divisions, worth $15,000, for each sex on Monday for will consist of two races for both males and females. The colt divisions will go postward in races three and five, with the former containing the only horses to win three Weiss preliminaries to date in the Western Terror gelding Dash Of Danger, who will start from post two for driver Matt Kakaley and trainer Ron Burke. In the other division, one-time Weiss winners Dakota Jack and Rough Odds will have to solve the outside posts five and six, respectively.
With the females, most attention will focus on race 10, where Cousin Mary (post three) will try to post her seventh win in succession, with her main obstacle looking to be Miss Jones (post one), who herself is like her rival 2-for-2 in the Weiss. No fewer than three Weiss prelim winners are gathered in the other section, race four, with Angel’s Pride starting from post six after a victory in Weiss action last week.
Shifting to Tuesday, there will be three divisions of trotting action for both the males and females. The distaffs will be racing in their fourth and final preliminary; the males started their Weiss competition a week later, so this will be their third preliminary round.
Three of the boys won in both their Weiss preliminaries so far and one of them will fall from the ranks of the unbeaten, where Hilarious Hero (post two) and Ooh Rah (post three) sure to give each other a stern test on Tuesday. The other double Weiss winner in this group, Bend In The River, has drawn post six in the 12th race division; the third male division goes in race four.
In the action for females, the Cantab Hall mare Connie Jean will start from the outside post six in race three after winning in the Weiss last week in 1:55, the fastest time in the Weiss trotting preliminaries, regardless of sex. Starting just inside her will be an interesting newcomer in Checkmate Time, who won two preliminaries in the New Jersey Sire Stakes last year, and then was favored over eventual North American divisional champion Ariana G in the series final, only to suffer an interference break and find her season at an end. This is her first start since that July 15 race.
Nosed out by Connie Jean last week after winning her first two Weiss starts was Sunrise Avenue. If she is to regain her winning ways in race 11, she will have to do so from the outside post seven against three opponents who already sport Weiss wins. The fifth race division features two winners from the Weiss preliminaries, as one leaves from the inside in the field of six, Talkin Tootsie, and one from the outside, Hot Mess Hanover.
Fast-class overnight horses will be featured on the Saturday and Sunday Pocono cards. On Saturday there will be a $25,000 winners-over pace, and coming back will be last week’s winner, Orillia Joe, whose 1:49.4 clocking was the fastest of the young season at Pocono. Among his rivals will be Major Uptrend, coming off three straight wins at Dover; Barimah A, also a victor in his last three starts against top-level foes; and Next Success, who has won four in a row but who makes the big jump from high claimers now.
On Sunday, Migrate Blue Chip, who has doubled his lifetime win total by taking his last three starts, will be looking to make it four straight in the featured $18,000 pace; co-featured will be three $16,000 events: one for each sex on the trot and one for male pacers.