Life in Ohio has been good for Chris Lems

Trenton, NJ — Life is good for Chris Lems.

He always wanted to be a Standardbred harness racing driver, and he is.

He was able to satisfy both himself and his parents by attending college while still pursuing a career.

It was suggested he try racing at Northfield Park in 2017, which he did. He has enjoyed success in Ohio ever since and has no grand plans of looking elsewhere.

“The money’s good,” the 35-year-old said. “I’m pretty much content here right now. I’ve got no plans for moving or anything like that.”

And why should he?

This year, he’s on pace to surpass his best totals.

Lems has raced this year strictly at Northfield, where he is currently third in victories with 110, trailing Aaron Merriman and Ronnie Wrenn Jr. That total puts him in 11th place among North American drivers. He also has 105 second-place finishes, 109 thirds and $995,247 in earnings.

“I couldn’t be happier with the way it started so far this year,” he said. “It’s been a little bit of a surprise. I guess I got a lot of good work this year. I don’t know exactly if anything’s changed or why it’s going better but I’m happy with it.

“Maybe, with success, you always get more work and usually a little better work. For the most part I guess my main accounts have just been a little better and I’ve gotten some better horses at the moment.”

Lems considers his top accounts to be trainers Marion Chupp and Herman Hagerman, along with the horses he owns that are trained by Jordan Hope.

“Jordan and I don’t have many, but they’re quality,” Lems said. “I’ve driven all Marion’s horses for the last two or three years, pretty regularly. He’s really been my main account. He started in the business under Herman.

“When Marion went on his own, I guess it probably took a couple years to get a stable built up. But he has pretty good numbers and turns a lot of horses over and what not.”

Chris met Chupp through Hagerman, who began giving him work when he arrived at Northfield.

“People are always looking for a new driver,” Lems said. “When you’re a fresh face, maybe I just had a little luck for him early on. Since then, it’s kind of been hot and cold but this year Herman’s been very good to me.”

Lems is a third-generation horseman born and raised in Canton, South Dakota, a suburb of Sioux Falls. His hometown is two miles from Iowa and 15 miles from Minnesota, and Chris grew up racing fairs with his uncles in those states.

“My father grew up in it, but he didn’t actually race horses,” Lems said. “But my grandfather and my uncles were both trainers and drivers. I was involved in football and wrestling but I spent a lot of time at the farm; as much as I could. This is always what I wanted to do.”

The youngster had decent success — he calls it “a little luck” — at the fairs. His parents were fine with him pursuing a driving career under one condition — that he go to college. A trainer friend of his uncle’s suggested SUNY Morrisville in New York, which offers the nation’s lone Standardbred only program. Thus, the compromise was made and Chris headed for the “bright lights” of the east.

Thankfully, they weren’t that bright where he landed.

“Upstate New York kind of surprises you,” Lems said. “When I was going from South Dakota to go to New York for college I was a little nervous thinking it was going to be city life. When I got there I thought ‘This town’s no bigger than the town I lived in.’ Where I’m at now in Ohio (Streetsboro) is actually a little busier than where I was in New York.”

During his first year at Morrisville (in the fall of 2005), Chris met trainer Howard Okusko Jr.

“I started working for him in the fall of 2006 and I’m best friends with him to this day,” Lems said. “When I met Howie, I brought two horses that I owned. He let me take his rig and go race them. I went and raced at Rockingham and Pocono a couple times and then Vernon opened up and I got a job working for Howard at the track and I started catch driving.

“Howard actually gave me my first New York Sires Stakes win. I drove quite a bit for him. He was good to me.”

Lems also drove for George Ducharme, trainer of 2013 Hambletonian winner Royalty For Life. He drove Dude’s The Man and Royalty For Life in races at Vernon to prepare them for major Grand Circuit events.

“The week before (the Hambletonian) I drove him; they had an opening for Royalty For Life at Vernon,” Lems recalled. “That was probably the most excited I was for a race.”

During his 11-year stay at Vernon, Lems was the track’s leading driver in 2014 and finished second five times. He also won a New Jersey Sires Stakes final in 2016 with Designated Drinker, a 2-year-old filly pacer he owned. In the winters he trained for Hope at Spring Garden Ranch in Florida, and in late 2017 Jordan suggested Lems drive for him at Northfield Park.

“We came out here,” Lems recalled, “and it was going good enough that I decided to stay in Ohio rather than going back to New York.”

It’s easy to see why. His first full year at Northfield (in 2018), Lems won 234 races and earned $2,116,003. He has won more than $2 million in each of his three full years in Ohio and won $1,669,238 in the 2020 Covid-shortened season. During his Northfield career, Lems has finished fourth in the driver standings each of the past three seasons. He has 2,477 career wins and $18,735,351 in career earnings.

With the success he is enjoying in Northfield, Lems rarely strays from the Buckeye State. He did some stakes drives for Scott Cox and Hagerman in recent years, and may stray out-of-state if a 2-year-old he likes comes along.

“Everybody thinks they’ve got great 2-year-olds now,” Lems said with a laugh. “I’m at the same farm as Scott Cox. When he starts biking them up I’ll go down and train a bunch of them for him. I’ll have an idea then if I like one of them or not, but it’s a little too early for that now.”

For now, Chris will remain content at Northfield, and continue to utilize lessons he learned from watching one of his peers.

“I’ve driven with a lot of really good drivers,” Lems said. “Going around the New York Sires Stakes, Jimmy Morrill always amazed me. He could make horses go and not have to beat them up to do it. For somebody I drove with a lot, I always tried to watch him to try and figure out how to get horses to go. Not that I could do it anywhere close to what he did.”

Nonetheless, he’s still doing it pretty darn well.

by Rich Fisher, for the USTA