Bigly hoping to race bigly in $133,106 PASS

WASHINGTON, PA, June 3, 2022 — There’s no doubt that Bigly (Cantab Hall) has been racing, well, bigly of late, but is he ready to step up to face the top 3-year-old male harness racing trotters in Pennsylvania? He’ll get that chance in Saturday’s $133,106 Pennsylvania Sires Stake at Hollywood Casino at The Meadows.

Bigly leaves from post 6, race 11, for trainer/driver Aaron Johnston. The card also features a $60,000 PA Stallion Series stake for 3-year-old colt and gelding trotters. First post is 12:45 PM.

With $44,120 on his card, Bigly already has been a success for Johnston and his wife, Jennifer Johntson, who owns the gelding with Brian Taylor. They purchased him at Lexington for the bargain price of $8,000, so the connections already are in gravy time.

“He’s not the prettiest horse,” his trainer says. “He’s a little small, and he toes in just a little. But we watched his video, and he didn’t trot the way he looks. That’s my category — the ones nobody wants to spend good money on.”

Bigly’s most recent race on May 26 at The Meadows was the best of his career, as he took his mark of 1:55.2 — earplugs unpopped —in an overnight event. That helped punch his PASS ticket.

“You see some of those horses going 1:53 out East. I think he could trot that much if we were out there,” Aaron Johnston says. “I don’t know if he belongs with this group or not. But I thought, ‘It’s here. I don’t have to ship, and we may see fields of five or six going for that kind of money. What the heck. We’ll take a shot.’”

Johnston, who trains his stable of nine at the Butler County Fairgrounds about 60 miles from The Meadows, thinks the key to a big check might be settling Bigly where he’s comfortable.

“When you put him in a spot where he’s following horses, he trots more. But I know that no matter what game plan I work out in my head, it will be different when the gate folds.”

Bigly has pulled off surprises before, such as finishing second at 57-1 in the 2021 stallion series final. But he’ll have his work cut out for him Saturday, as his division includes S I P (post 8, Yannick Gingras) and Parola Hanover (post 7, Corey Callahan), who finished 1-2 in last year’s PASS championship. No matter the outcome, Johnston already is hugely on Bigly.

“He’s made up for a couple other bad ones we’ve messed with the last few years. When you buy only two or three babies a year, it’s hard to find a diamond in the rough.”

by Evan Pattak, for the Meadows Standardbred Owners Association