3R racing spotlight returns to locally-based stars

TROIS RIVIÉRES QUE – James MacDonald, the 2017 World Driving Champion when the harness racing event was held in Canada (a leg of it at Hippodrome 3R), gets a chance for a second world crown in New Zealand in 2025.

The top Toronto driver won this year’s National Driving Championship (NDC), an event hosted at the Quebec half-mile track on Friday (July 5), which produced excellent racing and was much appreciated by the area’s patrons. Now the 3R racing spotlight returns to the locally-based stars, both equine and human.

Sunday’s eleven-race card, which begins at noon, is topped by the $6500 Preferred pace, with a field of nine going in the tenth race event. Six of the nine entrants have already beaten 2:00 at Hippodrome 3R this season, and given good weather on Sunday, a clocking in the 1:55-1:56 range may be necessary to win.

The early favorite is Twin B Powerball, who will start from post three for driver Robert Shepherd (who finished tied for second in the NDC pointstandings), trainer David Pilon, and owners Ecurie Francis Richard and Gaston Bibeau. After racing with success in central Ontario, the Bettors Delight gelding shipped to 3R last week and promptly won in 1:56, and he could be even tougher with a race over the track.

Also highly-regarded in this collection are two horses who won in this class during June, both trained by Michel Allard: Frozen Hanover (post one, driver Stephane Brosseau) and YS Sensationalcity (the trailing post nine, driver Denis St Pierre).

The stakes season starts at Hippodrome 3R next week with the first round of the Trophée des Éleveurs Series for three-year-olds, to be followed by the initial leg of the Coupe de L’Avenir Series for two-year-olds. Both age brackets will have their Championship races on Sunday, September 8, with $480,000 in purse money on the line – annually one of the most exciting days on the local calendar.

Sunday’s co-feature is the third race, a $5800 purse event for precocious two-year-old pacing fillies looking to prep for their Coupe de L’Avenir action in two weeks time. The two early favorites are Myvaliam (post two, driver William Roy for trainer Guy Roy)  and Justine Ray (post five, the most successful post at 3R so far this year, with leading driver Pascal Berube for trainer Yves St Jacques). The former beat the latter by a length in a 2:04.3 line in their only charted line, but since two-year-olds sometimes develop so rapidly, no one can be ruled out as the young misses steadily learn the racing game.

In the only non-Canadian Driving Championship race on the Friday card, the veteran mare X O X O posted the fastest trotting time of the year at 3R, 1:58, with Denis St Pierre up for trainer Michel Allard and owner Danielle Henri, giving X O X O two straight wins since returning to Quebec.

Later in a NDC race, Bonfire Bash trotted in 2:00, with the 2:00 double on the trot equaling that achievement first reached this year on May 19. … The Driving Championship was very formful: in its eight races, six favorites won and the other two finished second, and the biggest win price was the $8.40 returned by Albert Alpha in the last race.

 From Hippodrome 3R