by Mark Ratzky, publicity department, Sacramento Harness Association

Sacramento, CA — Wildest Dream, who has been pounding on the door at this level, and Above Timberline, who is coming off back-to-back victories with softer types, head the $3,100 pacing co-features at Cal-Expo on Wednesday night (November 28).

Above Timberline will try to keep his winning streak alive in the night’s sixth race, while Wildest Dream gets top billing while doing his work from the outside slot in the nightcap on the 10-race program. Rick Plano handles both pacers, with Above Timberline hailing from the Greig Watson barn, while Wildest Dream is a Plano trainee.

Wildest Dream is a 3-year-old son of Dream Away and the No Nukes mare Miss Verisign who is owned by Dave Haness. He has three wins from his 16 starts this season with a 1:55 mark that was set earlier in the year at Pocono Downs in Pennsylvania.

The bay gelding shows up for Wednesday’s assignment having been the runner-up in four of his last five starts, with a third-place finish in the other attempt. All of those outings have come at the level he is currently racing at, and there is reason to believe he is going to break through this time around.

After missing a start earlier this month, Wildest Dream left from the second tier for his November 17 outing and had to settle for the show check. Sent off as the 7-5 chalk in last week’s tour, Plano was always close with his pacer. He came first-over into the last turn, gamely battled it out the length of the drive, but was unable to contain the second-over Harmony and lost a head decision in a 1:55.1 once-around.

Anything near a repeat of that mile is going to make Wildest Dream the one to beat in this line-up, although landing the outside post in the field of eight does make things a bit more challenging.

Meanwhile, Above Timberline is a lightly raced Denali homebred who really seems to be getting the hang of things. He was third and then fifth in his first two tries while coming from well back, then exploded late in his third outing to be up in the late stages with Jim Lackey at the helm.

With Plano handling the lines in last week’s effort, Above Timberline looked every bit the 1-5 shot that night as he made the lead at the half and took complete control of things from that point. At the wire, he had over eight lengths on his nearest rival in a 1:56.3 performance.

Bal-Cal offers cross-country puzzle

Wednesday night (November 28) means 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 (races 9 and 10) from Cal-Expo. The $1 bet comes attached with a $25,000-guaranteed pool.

To see the value this wager offers, you need only look at last week’s Bal-Cal results, which saw a healthy $4,112 going to each correct dollar ticket. Three of the winners were quite predictable, as evidenced by their odds of 3-2, 7-2 and 5-1, while an 18-1 winner over the Balmoral oval obviously sparked the big numbers.

While the Bal-Cal saw a modest payoff two weeks ago, the prior three editions of this bet saw returns of $2,760, just shy of $2,000 and $1,500, proving it’s very worthwhile to get involved. Last fall there were monster payouts of $20,000, $19,000 and $18,000 for just a buck.

Post time for the first leg of the Bal-Cal Challenge is scheduled for 8:23 p.m. (PST).

Be sure to circle Saturday, December 8, on your calendar. In addition to being championship night for the 3-year-old trotters and pacers, there will be a travel bag giveaway at all California night simulcast locations.

Live racing resumes at Cal-Expo on Wednesday (November 28) continuing through Saturday. Post times are scheduled for 5:35 p.m. (PST). On Wednesday, admission is free, plus Cal-Expo offers a complete lasagna dinner, with salad and bread, for just $3.00. The estimated total pool in the Pick-6 (races 4-9) on Wednesday is $17,500.