Ladies take center stage at Meadville

MEADVILLE PA – Four “ladies” captured the harness racing spotlight during Saturday and Sunday’s Pennsylvania Fair Sire Stakes action at the Crawford County Fairgrounds in this city in northwest Pennsylvania.

First to shine was the International Moni – Nightflix Hanover filly H Moni Winner, who lowered the Meadville record for freshman trotting fillies to 2:03.2 from A Little Laid Back’s 2015 standard of 2:04.1. Chris Shaw sat behind the filly for the first time in a race during Saturday’s two-year-old action, and he and H Moni Hanover bonded well right away for trainer Dana Kahrig and owner Joseph Burkholder.

21-year-old Elizabeth Snyder was not originally scheduled to drive Golden Magic in Saturday’s last race, but the trainer (and her father) Doug Snyder put her up for her first drive in as pressureless a situation as a newcomer could want – a walkover. Elizabeth got the job done with the Always B Miki filly – thus immediately putting her UDR at 1.000.

The three-year-olds came out for Sunday’s racing, and in the day’s very first race the Betting Line filly Showboat Hanover, the 2023 Fair Championship winner, smashed the track record of 2:00.3 (held by two very good fillies named Unbeamlieveable and Camera Lady) for her pacing group, touring the Meadville twicearound in 1:59 for the fastest time of the meet. Trainer/driver Todd Schadel is also co-owner of Showboat Hanover with wife Christine and Caitlin Solt.

The blue and white colors of Schadel were back out in force in the three-year-old filly trot, winning one of the “A” sections and both of the “B”s. If you had to guess which one of these winners would lower their section’s standard to 2:01.1 while coming within a tick of Classicality’s 2013 all-time Meadville trot mark of 2:01, you could be forgiven if you guessed Loveyoubunches, who has set four fair track records this summer and who did win in the “A” section.

However, the correct answer would be a “B” division winner! The International Moni filly Jakarta Hanover, a winner of a division of the Lady Suffolk Trot at Freehold, visited the fairs and promptly hung up that 2:01.1 clocking for the ownership of Todd Schadel and Jim Simpson (a good day for the Hall Of Famer, who also was an owner of a Stallion Series winner at Philly).

No points for guessing who the leading driver and trainer was at Meadville (hint: it was the same person), but also having an excellent stand were drivers Eric Neal and Chris Shaw, who had four winners each, and trainer Tom Loughry Jr., who harnessed three successful horses.

After eight cards in eight days, even the Pennsylvania Fair Circuit now gets to take a rest. A very short rest – they’ll be drawing Tuesday for racing at Indiana PA on Thursday and Friday, with both cards slated to start at 2 p.m.

For complete race results, click here: US Trotting results.

From the PFHHA, PHHA, and the MSOA partnership