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It almost sounds silly to brag that you own 1/100th of a horse, but today’s blog is about a guy - i.e. me - who owns 1% of a trotter and because of that, I had a real thrill Saturday night. In the fall of 2008, I acquired one share of a horse named Son of Paige, who is now six years old. Each share in Paige cost $300 and the syndicate is run by Harness Racing Canada, a company that helps people get into the racing game with very modest investment.  The beauty of owning even a tiny piece of a harness horse is that they are a sturdier breed than the thoroughbreds and can generally run 3-4 times a month. So three or four times a month for the last 14 or 15 months, I’ve been able to brag, “My horse is out tonight.”

 My horse was out Saturday night. Son of Paige has been racing at Western Fair for a few months and it has been awhile since I saw him work, so when I was apprised that trainer Wayne Preszcator had brought the son of Angus Hall to Woodbine, it was very convenient for me.

The January issue of Down The Stretch came to my house on Friday morning (actually 4500 issues of it, as delivered by Mclaren Press).  It’s a great issue (easy for the editor to say) with its cover proclaiming 25 ways to save harness racing . As editor, publisher, photographer, writer and delivery boy, I had to get papers to Woodbine, so off I Saturday evening, piling up the papers in the bins and dropping off 150 or so to the racing office, drivers room and paddock restaurant. While in the paddock, I got to visit my horse. He’s a nice looking colt, about average size for a trotter, but the groom, Ian, didn’t seem overly optimistic about his chances in the first race, which had a purse of $19,000 for horses who had failed to earn $10,000 in their last six tries. Since Paige went on an ugly break and finished last six days ago in London, he wasn’t a great bet, though the rest of the field looked equally un-special. I gave my horse a pat on the head and he threw his mane around and I didn’t know what to think of that.

“Get me a cheque,” I implored and left to watch the race from the grandstand.

And it sure was surprising. Son of Paige had shown no early speed in any of his last five races at Western Fair, but driver Mario Baillargeon gunned him from the six-hole and he trotted nicely to the top by the first turn. However the opening quarter of 26.4 made me cringe. Even with a crisp easterly wind barreling down the stretch, that seemed too fast. Down the backstretch, Dougie Brown took his horse out of second and slipped to the front, which couldn’t have been more perfect for Son of Paige because it meant he had cover, that the other horse was breaking the wind and a slower second quarter gave Paige a nice breather. As they entered the stretch, you could see that the rest of the field was struggling and that this one would be decided between the top two. With less than a furlong to go, Baillargeon pulled Son of Paige to the middle of the track and he easily overhauled the leader to hit the wire first by a length and a quarter.

Realizing what was happening, I actually pulled out my cellphone and shot the stretch run. You can barely make out the horses, but you can hear me shouting, “Holy Shit!”

 Son of Paige went off at 9-2 and paid more than $11 to win and unfortunately, I didn’t bet on him.

I raced to the winners circle and was joined by the groom and a man and woman, whose names I was too self-absorbed to get and we all posed in the winners circle as track photographer Clive Cohen took our picture. Baillargeon put me in a headlock just as the camera snapped.

Of the purse of $19,000, Son of Paige won $9500. I’m entitled to 1% of that, but by the tine the trainer, vet, groom, blacksmith, syndicate manager, acupuncturist, secretary, donut delivery boy and equine masseuse take their cut, I’ll end up with about $40. 

I know that doesn’t sound like much, but last year, Paige won 6 of 30 races for about $75,000 and I got close to $400 in cheques that showed up in little amounts throughout the year. Son of Paige is one of Harness Racing Canada’s success stories - everyone who bought in to him has gotten more than their money back and he continues to race and cash cheques. Saturday’s win brings him up to more than $12,000 so far, so he’s on pace to win more than $100,000 in 2010.

This will give me a little to talk about at two important horse racing events this week. The Sovereign Awards are being held Friday night and Down The Stretch, Canada’s most informative and entertaining horse racing newspaper has five nominations, more than any other horse, owner, trainer, jockey or newspaper. We have three in one category as Perry Lefko, Keith McCalmont and Eleanor Yeoman LeBlanc all made the final for Outstanding News Story. Lefko is also up for Outstanding Feature Story and it would be a travesty of justice if I win for Best picture, but the shot I took of Chantal Sutherland wrapped in the Canadian flag is up against three real photographs in the Outstanding Picture category.

Down The Stretch has no nominations for the O’Briens, the standardbred awards banquet, but I will be attending the event on Saturday and intend to wear the exact same suit that I wear on Friday because I basically have just one decent suit anyway. At the O’Briens, I hope to get some feedback on the latest issue of Down The Stretch, which has a lot of harness material in it.  There’s stuff on the United Trotting Associations’ Dan patch awards - Jody Jamieson won Driver of the Year there and he’s a cinch to be named the Canadian DOY.  Along with our two pager on the 25 ways to save harness racing, we also have a beautiful two page spread of pictures from Boxing Day when the drivers were coming back caked in slop and mud.

We also have a lovely presentation of the four pictures up for Sovereigns and the two nominated for O’Briens. Our layout guy Gord Steventon has them hanging in the Louvre, you know right beside the Mona Lisa….and if you’re wondering about that enigmatic smile of hers…it’s because she had $20 across on Son of Paige!

I have been advised that there are pretty good numbers regarding the masses who visit this blog regularly. Not to puff myself up too much, but perhaps some of you have a certain appreciation for solid sports writing. If so, this one is for you. My colleague, Perry Lefko, conducts a Sports Writing course at the University of Toronto and apparently, there are still a few days remaining to sign up for the next series.

Lefko has a pretty amazing resume. He has written for pretty well all the major papers and has a long list of books that he’s produced. My favourite is Ride of a Lifetime, an awesome bio of jockey Sandy Hawley. Lefko has also written an epic on the Breeders’ Cup and one on Pinball Clemens as well. For a couple of years, he has contributed to Down The Stretch, Canada’s most informative and entertaining horse racing newspapers. That’s pertinent information, because two of Lefko’s 2009 columns in Down The Stretch have been honoured by the Jockey Club of Canada with Sovereign Award nominations. Considering the most nominations you can get for writing is two, Lefko has had a very fine year.  Lefko has a long history of being blinged by the Jockey Club; in 1989 he took the Sovereign Award for Outstanding Feature Story and in 1994, he walked away with the trophy for Outstanding Newspaper Article.

Perry is an edgy, aggressive and funny guy (ok, not as funny as me), and certainly qualified to pass on the skills that are necessary for compelling and accurate sports writing. Below is information he has provided me about the course.   You have less than two weeks to enroll

Have you ever wanted to be a sports writer? Now is your chance.

Perry Lefko, one of the contributing writers to Down The Stretch, is teaching a course on it at the University of Toronto’s School of Continuing Studies following the success of the first course that just ended.

It’s once a week on Mondays for 2 1/2 hours beginning January 25 at the St. George Campus and runs for eight weeks.

You’ll learn the basic tools of writing and apply it to sports. Whether you want to do it professionally or just as a hobby, you’ll be given the ways and means to construct your thoughts for multi-media, multi-platform usage.

The course has practical applications for newspaper or magazine work, television, radio and the internet. More than ever, there are opportunities beyond just the traditional ways to express yourself as a writer, in particular a sports writer.

In addition to what I’ll be teaching, I’ll be bringing in guest speakers, many of them high-profile individuals whose work you have read or whom you have seen on TV or heard on the radio.

I brought in a high-profile retired athlete for the first course and plan to do that again.

Many students from the first course had articles published. One has gone on to become an intern for a major radio show.

Weekly assignments will be evaluated and discussed.

The course is fun and interactive and there is lots of discussion.

And best of all it’s not limited to guys. Two women signed up for the first class and one had several articles published, while another interviewed a woman sportscaster for a video.

Get into the game.

For more information, call 416-978-2400 and ask about the Freelance Sports Writing Course. The course number is 2360-002. Or you can go to www.learn.utoronto.ca and look for the Freelance Sportswriter Course in the courses section.

Ok, guess I’m still steaming about the selection of Alexandra Wozniak as the winner of the Bobbie Rosenfeld Award as Canada’s athlete of the year. This rant of mine is not meant to demean Wozniak. She’s very much a bright light in the darkness that has been women’s tennis in this country, but in 2009, she did not win a tournament. So the voters gloried a woman who did ‘pretty good’, but virtually ignored Chantal Sutherland who had an amazing year, finishing second in Canada in wins with 139.  Earlier this week, Wozniak lost a second round match to a woman ranked 80th in the world, this in a tournament in Hobart, Australia, where Wozniak was the 6th seed.

During the same time frame, Sutherland showed her courage and guts. In the last race Sunday, January 10, she was on a longshot, Nana Beach and as the field turned into the stretch, Nana Beach was losing touch. instead of making a left turn to follow the field, the filly, perhaps smelling the hot dogs under the stands, went straight to the outside rail. At the last moment, Sutherland avoided disaster by throwing herself off the horse and landing ingloriously in a heap on the track. Three days later as racing resumed at Santa Anita, Sutherland was back in the saddle ( or what passes for a saddle for a jockey) and she rallied The Town Lady from last in the six-horse field to victory at odds of 2.90 in the mile and a sixteenth starter’s allowance. This is Sutherland’s third victory of the Santa Anita meet and - not to be cruel - three more wins than Wozniak has in the last 13 months.

The Ontario Racing commission dealt recently with a couple of harness driving infractions and had a different response to each case.  Both Jody Jamieson and Doug McNair had been punished with fines and suspensions for violating the same rule that restricts what a driver is allowed to do with his whip.  Jamieson, who ran up 15 whipping violations in 2009 was originally fined $1000 and suspended 10 days for his work in the stretch on Lucky Terror at Georgian Downs on August 20.  The ORC ruled that Jamieson “did use his whip in an excessive manner during the stretch drive.” At the time, Jamieson appealed the penalty and was granted a stay of the penalties. Since JJ was chasing down the Canadian record for victories, it was pretty obvious that he wanted to stay on track and this decision did not come down until December 30, at which point, Jamieson’s 796 wins were already in the bag. At the appeal, the ORC viewed the tape of the race which indicates that Jamieson used the whip on Lucky Terror as many as 19 times ( Jamieson claims it was just 14).  The panel deciding Jamieson’s fate actually agreed with the driver that the action was just ‘tippy taps’ and that no brutality was involved; however, under the new rules, 14-19 uses of the whip without a break is a clear violation. The ORC decision  makes the point that not only has been Jamieson been a multiple offender, but he actually sat on the board which hammered out the new rules.  It’s interesting that in his defence, Jamieson pointed out that he has participated in more than 3000 races in the last year, so 15 whip violations isn’t really that much.  The new whip rule has almost polarized the industry and puts drivers in a difficult situation - i.e. should they break the rule to ensure their horses win?  Just speculating here, but perhaps Jamieson is playing a little harness driving politics here - do what he has to do to win and pay the price later.

The other decision came down hard on 19 year-old Doug McNair for his whip abuse on OK Commander in the 6th race at Mohawk on August 16. At the time, McNair was fined $500 and suspended five days because he ” did use his whip in an indiscriminate manner during the stretch drive.” McNair appealed the penalty, but here’s where it got ugly. Apparently he changed his mind about the appeal and left a phone message the night before the hearing at 10:15 advising the panel that he was abandoning his case. To this, the ORC wrote,

“Mr. McNair’s conduct, in respect to the due process system as so enshrined to protect the rights of all licensees, is despicable.” 

Now that’s a bit harsh, don’t you think. Despicable?The guy is just a kid, a teenager. He’s been called to the principal’s office and he’s probably a little scared. At first, he thinks, ‘oh I’ll just stand up to them and declare my innocence,’ but as the date drew closer, he probably got cold feet, understanding he had little chance of winning.

The ORC was clearly pissed that he scheduled the hearing, then stiffed them. Because of this, McNair’s fine was doubled to $1000 and his suspension extended to 7 days. McNair has also been fined an additional $1500 for ‘frivolous appeal.”  This would be McNair’s 11th whipping violation in 17 months

So what do we learn from this? The ORC is trying to protect the horses and make racing look gentler and kinder. Jody Jamieson gets off easier than Doug McNair because he knows how to play the game a little better.  Even so, the new whipping rules aren’t sitting comfortably with either the horsemen or the fans. There are different applications in every jurisdictions. For example, fans betting on the races at the Meadowlands are likely to see the drivers being much more aggressive with the whip than their Ontario counterparts.

New whip rules also exist for the thoroughbreds and that could create a very disastrous outcome. Imagine a French or British jockey winning the Patisson International on a world champion, but doing so with an extra flick of the whip (only three allowed, then a break). Would the stewards risk an International conflagration by DQ-ing the winner?

Discuss amongst yourselves