Red Mile to host $400,000 Kentucky Proud Finals

$400,000 will be given out on Sunday (July 21) at Red Mile as the top two and three-year-old harness racing horses assemble for the Kentucky Proud Finals.

Two-year-old pacing fillies start the festivities off and will set the tone. The morning line favourite, Cinamontoastcrunch (Captain Crunch) and she has well earned the honor. She has won three races in a row and put up a lifetime mark of 1:56.3 in her last outing. The Erv Miller-trained filly has yet to finish worse than second place in her four career starts. Miller already has 134 wins this year and has won over $2.6 million in prize money. Marcus Miller will team up with the youngster for the first time as he looks to help the filly continue her roll.

Erv Miller has another Captain Crunch filly in the first race, Perfect World. Even though she won her never finished outside the top three in her four career starts, the morning line odd maker put her at 15-1. Her only win came at the half-mile track in Lebanon. Perfect World paced the mile in 1:59.4. Joey Putnam will need to push the filly hard if she wants to upset the field and her stable mate.  

Two-year-old pacing boys are the next in the age group to be featured and they show up in the third race. Although he hasn’t won in over a month, Doc’s Buddy (He’s Watching) is the morning line favourite. His last win was at Oak Grove and he paced a lifetime mark of 1:57.4. Although he hasn’t won since then, the Randal Jerrell-trained colt has yet to finish worse than third in his seven career starts. Jerrell himself with be in the bike and he will be eyeing his 14th driving win of the year. 

The Cattlewash sired colt, Fleet Commander draws the rail and enters the final on a two-race win streak. His latest win came in a personal best time of 1:57.1 and it was the third win of his career.  He has finished in the top three five times but has never finished second yet in his career.  Fleet Commander is the sole trainee of Curtis Bradford at the moment. The Tennessee-based trainer only has seven career wins of his own and could nearly double his career-earning total with a win on Sunday. Bradford will also be in the bike himself and is one short of 130 career wins heading into the day.

Two top-performing trotting fillies will hook up in the fourth race. Gottakeepondreamin (Greenshoe) has won three in a row after finishing second place three straight times to start her career. She trotted the mile in a personal best of 1:59 in her last outing. Her lines show that she likes the grab the front end early and is hard to catch once she gets there. Rodney Debeck usually handles driving duties himself but will hand them off to Andy Miller on Sunday.

The other filly who will be hard to beat is Nikki Strikes (Father Patrick). She has two wins in four starts but has never finished worse than second place either. Her most recent victory was in 1:59 which stands as her best time.  Pat Curtin has been behind the filly in all four previous starts and will be back there once again on Sunday. Nikki Strikes got the better of Gottakeepdreamin the last time they two met up. They finished one-two on the half-mile track at Lacenter, Kentucky and Nikki Strikes won by a close neck in 2:02.1.

The first final for sophomores comes in the second race of the afternoon and trotting colts & geldings take center stage. The morning line odds have a clear favourite in Swan Explosion (Swan For All) at 8-5. However, his recent lines are not much different than others in the field. His only win was in 2:01.1 on a half-mile surface and in his latest appearance, he finished second with a time of 1:56.4 at the Red Mile.

The 5-1 Tom’s Muscle (Long Tom) just recently won at the Red Mile in 1:55 and beat out longshot Final entrants like Beauastel and Escaper. They both recorded times faster than the 1:56.4 mile by Swan Explosion. However, the edge in the odds for Swan Explosion is likely to be due to being teamed up with Marvin Luna who has already amassed 127 wins in the bike this year.

Pacing three-year-old fillies kick off the last Pick 3 in the seventh race and the most race-tested in the field, Real Deal Lindy (Huntsville) draws the rail. She has won nine races in her career, seven of which have some in 2024. She has only finished outside the top three once this year and twice in her entire career. The Erv Miller-train pacer has a lifetime mark of 1:52.1 but has shown the ability to go even faster in her latest start even though she did not get the victory.

Christopher Beaver has the co-favourites in the three-year-old trotting filly Final. The slight edge goes to Weslynn Pursuit (Father Patrick). She has won eight of her nine starts this year and is coming off a career-best victory in 1:56.3. Her only blemish this year came when she went off stride at the start of a race and was unable to recover. Emanuel Miller has been teamed up with filly as of late and will continue to grow the chemistry on Sunday

The other Beaver entry, Social Chatter (Swan For All) has four wins this year and the fast was in 1:58.3. She has finished outside the top three twice in 11 starts this year after not being able to finish near the top last year. With Emmanuel Miller teaming up with Weslynn Pursuit, Social Chatter will be in the capable hands of Peter Wrenn.

The card will end with the pacing glamour boys and Bet On Big Joe (Betting Line) will be looking to continue his success. He has won back-to-back races and has won seven of his last eight. He only has one hiccup on his record this year but otherwise has finished top two in his other nine starts. His lifetime mark of 1:52.4 was achieved at the five-eighths track at Oak Grove and a similar performance will be tough to beat.

Racing begins at 12:00 p.m. (CDT) Sunday at the Red Mile.

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

by Trey Colbeck, for Harnesslink