Brady Galliers pulls off mild upset

American Girl (Trace Tetrick) ran her Miami Valley Raceway win streak to three by winning the $20,000 Mares Open pace on Friday (March 25) for the second consecutive week; while upstart Jackie’s Rocket (Brady Galliers) pulled a mild harness racing upset in the $20,000 championship leg of the Herb Coven Jr. Memorial series.

For the second straight week American Girl benefitted from a pocket ride behind Native Dream (John DeLong), collaring the pacesetter in the stretch to produce a repeat one-two finish from seven days ago with the exacta returning a surprisingly handsome $28.80.  Although A Little Starstruk and Igottafeelinfran each took a shot going first-up at the leaders during the midsection of the race,  the runnerup and eventual winner were charted first and second at each of the quarter mile substations, clocked in :27, :56 and 1:23.3 before American Girl stopped the clock in 1:52.1. 

Owned by Darla Gaskin and Stanley Rosenblatt, the seven-year-old daughter of Art’s Chip now has amassed 32 victories and $628,188 in earnings.  She has earned over $40,000 in eight seasonal starts at Miami Valley for conditioner Tyler George.

The Herb Coven Jr. Memorial, one of nine series honoring ‘Lebanon Legends’ of years gone by, featured distaff pacers who were non-winners four pari-mutuel races or $30,000 at the time of nomination.  Jackie’s Rocket, a four-year-old American Ideal mare, pulled a mild upset with her usual impressive late-closing kick.  Twenty year old driver-trainer Brady Galliers, who also co-owns with his parents as Galliers Racing LLC, was content to sit seventh in the early going as Powered By Pink and favored Crystal Falls slugged it out up front through a :26.2 opening quarter.  Still seventh at the :55.2 half, Galliers waited until the three-quarters pole in 1:24 to swing three-wide for a sustained sprint to the wire in 1:53.4.

The series finale featured a spirited stretch drive with six mares in contention.  Each of the first five finishers was one-half length apart at the wire with Jackie’s Rocket getting the nod over Do U Mind (Josh Sutton), Swinging Cami (Jeremy Smith), Gray Shadow (Kyle Ater) and Miss Princess Leah (Chris Page). 

The $10,000 winner’s share was the largest purse Brady Galliers has captured in his young career and was particularly gratifying behind a horse he acquired as a “free” unraced throw-in in a three-horse acquisition two years ago.

·                            *                   *                        *                *                           *

Miami Valley Raceway has announced a change in its starting time for the Wednesday, March 30 qualifying races to 12:00 noon.   This one-week only starting time change was necessary to allow time for necessary plumbing changes in all the paddock bath stalls to be completed without missing a race date.

Gregg Keidel