$223,000 Roll With Joe Saturday

Trenton, NJ — Backstreet Shadow scored the biggest win of his harness racing career last year in the Roll With Joe Stakes for older pacers at Tioga Downs and enters this year’s race, which is Saturday at The Meadowlands, as the 2-1 morning-line favorite in his division.

But co-owner Mark Weaver nixed the notion that it’s special coming back to try and repeat that effort, or at least half that effort since the race has gone from one main event to two divisions.

“For us,” he said with a laugh, “what’s special about a race is the more zeros there are behind it.”

That being the case, the 6-year-old Shadow Play gelding could add another zero to the back end of his career earnings as a victory in his $111,500 Roll With Joe split would put him over the $1 million mark.

Now that’s special.

“That would be awesome,” Weaver said. “We picked him up midway through his 4-year-old year and he’s made a good chunk of the (potential) million with us.”

The Roll With Joe is one of four Grand Circuit stakes Saturday at The Meadowlands. Manchego is the 6-5 morning-line favorite in the $135,000 Crawford Farms Open Trot, Lyons Sentinel got the 3-1 nod in the $160,000 Artiscape Mares Open Pace, and Atlanta is the 3-1 choice in the $156,000 Joie De Vie Mares Open Trot.

Backstreet Shadow — trained by Ron Burke for Weaver Bruscemi, Burke Racing Stable, Larry Karr, and J&T Silva-Purnel & Libby — has won 28 races and banked $947,562 in 69 career starts, while hitting the board 18 other times. He was recommended to the connections by their main agent, Marc Reynolds, and the purchase was made in July 2019.

“His owner isn’t typically a seller, but he was looking to sell,” Weaver said. “We did some research on the horse to make sure everything added up. We took a shot and from the minute we got him he won his first five or six and he’s been great for us ever since.”

Backstreet Shadow finished in the money 16 times in 22 starts as a 4-year-old, winning 10 races and $248,200. Last season produced a career year with seven victories and $433,016 in earnings in 21 starts. In addition to winning the Roll With Joe, he hit the board in the Breeders Crown, TVG Open Pace championship, Sam McKee Memorial, and Allerage Farms Open Pace.

Entering Saturday’s Roll With Joe, he has four wins, two places and $97,400 in season’s earnings in nine starts. The horse is riding some momentum with consecutive victories in the Preferred at The Meadowlands.

“He’s been in great form the last month and a half,” Weaver said. “He’s just kind of running overnights but he pretty much seems to be in career form and we’re looking forward to him racing some of the bigger races the rest of the summer.

“It’s kind of tough for the trainers to keep these things sharp when they don’t really have races. Usually, they would have had the Ben Franklin at Pocono, and would have had a big race in Canada by now, I believe. They just haven’t had those opportunities. There aren’t many tracks for the right races for those caliber horses, so Ronnie does a good job of having them sharp at the right time. Maybe they can build on it the next three, four months.”

One of the other horses in “they” is This Is The Plan, another 6-year-old gelding, who will be in Saturday’s first Roll With Joe division and is also a 2-1 favorite. On June 5, he won the Battle of Lake Erie at Northfield Park in a world-record 1:47.3. Last week he finished second in the Open at The Meadowlands.

This Is The Plan, also acquired in 2019, has won 17 of 79 career starts and $2.21 million. He is owned by the same group as Backstreet Shadow.

“He’s solid,” Weaver said. “He’s probably more of a five-eighths or a half-mile horse, but he can be competitive on a big track. He doesn’t slow down as much as the others do on smaller tracks.”

Yannick Gingras will drive This Is The Plan out of post four.

“I think he’s probably better not being on the front, but a lot of times when you’re the favorite you take advantage of the respect you get on the front,” Weaver said. “I think in a perfect world he’ll be able to race out of a hole or behind. I think that would suit him well. But I like his chances. He should be tough in there.”

He also likes Backstreet Shadow’s chances with Tim Tetrick in the sulky one day before the driver gets inducted into the Harness Racing Hall of Fame. They will leave from post nine.

“I don’t think it’s the worst spot,” Weaver said. “It looks like there are a couple in there that could give him a run for his money. I would say Shake That House and Warrawee Vital are both pretty good. I would assume he’ll be going forward and either find a hole if they’re going crazy up front or, if not, maybe even controlling it. But I think it will be pretty tough in there.”

No matter how the race goes, Weaver feels his horse can handle it.

“I don’t think he takes a back seat to anyone in the aged division,” Weaver said. “He can go with any of them. He can do it on a half, he can do it on a mile, he can do it on the front, he can do it from last. Whatever the race calls for, he’s capable of doing it.

“He rarely misses a check; and is usually first or second against the best horses in training. I think his consistency and versatility with what tracks he can race at are what I like the most.”

Weaver is hoping that this weekend could mark the continuation of a strong run with Backstreet Shadow. Not just this season, but for years to follow.

“We’ve had a lot of success in our operation, with the older horses doing it year after year,” he said. “A lot of horses maybe peak at 5 or 6, whereas with us, over the last 10 or 12 years we’ve had success with horses racing at the top level as old as 9, 10, 11. Horses that continue to show up year in and year out in that aged division.

“I hope a year from now we’re talking about him hitting two million.”

Racing begins at 6:20 p.m. (EDT) Saturday at The Meadowlands. The Big M and TrackMaster have teamed to regularly provide free past performances for each race card. Past performances can be found here on The Meadowlands website.

by Rich Fisher, for the USTA