Borgata champ defends title in $457,000 final

Hellabalou (Sweet Lou) joined a select list of harness racing horses to win the MGM Borgata Pacing Series final in back-to-back seasons by taking Monday night’s (April 22) $457,000 championship in 1:50.2 after watching a duel for the lead between the two favorites and then pouncing on them past three-quarters.

After scoring at odds of 47-1 last year, he delivered at 11-1 this time around.

Coming into the last division of the prelims a week ago, Hellabalou was on the outside looking in, but a second-place finish to Linedrive Hanover got Hellabalou the points he needed to secure the last spot in the final, and he certainly took advantage.

“I had to be second and two horses couldn’t be the winner or something like that,” recalled winning driver Yannick Gingras. “The Burke Brigade, they’re on top of it. Mark Weaver does his math all the time, so they knew exactly what I had to get done. I think the race was pretty simple last week. I thought Linedrive Hanover was the best horse, and if we could sit on his back we had a good chance to be second. It worked out that way.”

In Monday’s championship Hellabalou charged away from the gate from post five and made 4-5 favorite Linedrive Hanover, driven by Scott Zeron, work almost all of the 26.4 opening quarter to clear him. Right behind Linedrive Hanover was even-money second choice Desperate Man (Matt Kakaley), and when Desperate Man moved up to challenge in the second quarter, Zeron opted to leave Desperate Man on the outside, resulting in a wicked 53.1 half-mile clocking.

The battle between Desperate Man and Linedrive Hanover continued around the third turn and to the 1:21.1 three-quarters, but Gingras, seeing that Coaches Corner (Jason Bartlett) was making a two-wide advance from sixth, got the jump on him entering the far turn and fired Hellabalou three-wide. After Hellabalou was shown the clear racetrack, he worked his way by the spent leaders midway through the bend and then had plenty left to seal the deal, defeating Coaches Corner by two lengths. Desperate Man was game to the wire and held third despite the impossible trip, while Whats Stanley Got A (George Brennan) and Dunkin’ (Tim Tetrick) completed the top five.

“He wasn’t right at the beginning of the series,” Gingras noted. “I thought his third leg when he finished second to Dunkin’ he was really, really good. I thought he was going in the right direction. Fourth leg, driver error, he was locked in and running over the top of horses. I figured I had the horse back. Last week I thought he was a weak second to Linedrive Hanover. I thought he should have been second, but he should have been a little bit better. I think things weren’t 100 percent for him last week, but all credit again to the Burke Brigade, they got him right and he was in tip-top shape tonight.

“I wasn’t too, too pleased honestly when they were going at it. One part of me was like ‘okay, that’s our chance to win,’ but the other part of me was like ‘it’s going way too fast and I’m too close to the fire.’ Hellabalou, he’s got all the ability, but sometimes when you’ve got to ask him, he doesn’t really like to do a little extra work. That’s the tricky part with him. When I had to chase him at the three-eighths just to keep up with those two, I’m like ‘I don’t know if that’s going to work out.’ At the half I still wasn’t sure, but once we came out of the third turn he was kind of swelling up on me. He felt good, so I liked my chances then.”