Down The Stretch Podcast

It’s amazing how many terrific things happen in horse racing in a week. How about 8 $225,000 OSS Super Finals at Mohawk? You have to hear Ken Middleton’s call of the 2 Year-Old Colts and Geldings Pace. We have the E.P.Taylor and Nearctic Stakes from Woodbine. Is Ironstone the best two year old thoroughbred in Canada? Will he give his trainer, Willie Armata his first Queen’s Plate contender and will Brazilian jockey Ademar Santos get a shot at Canada’s biggest race?

It’s déjà vu times two for Hall of Fame driver, Paul MacDonell who is winning repeatedly with both a son and a grandson of Somebeachsomewhere.

Imagine a night at the track when the same number keeps coming in race after race.

Bill Megens turns 88 in a few weeks and he’s still winning harness races. Carly Furlonger is about 6 decades younger than that, but she had her greatest day of riding last Wednesday at Ajax Downs. And how about a race from Gulfstream with a horse with no vowels in his name.

How did the ‘peoples’ horse’ Mighty Heart do in the Durham Cup? We have the call as well as multiple Stakes races from Woodbine and Mohawk. Hall of Fame driver Paul Macdonell tells us how excited he was to drive a talented grandson of Somebeachsomewhere. Owner Bruce Lunsford and trainer Barb Minshall flesh out the wild story of Breeders’ Stakes champion British Royalty. Mark Casse won 5 races at Woodbine on Saturday. Handicapper supreme Garnet Barnsdale supplies ideas to improve the standardbred program. Chantal Sutherland pays over $50 at Gulfstream. At Ajax Downs, a cool jockey named Castillo rode a horse named Cool Kastillo, and have you ever heard of a rider winning 8 Stakes races at the same track on the same day? You will if you listen to this podcast, which also includes guest musical performances from The Beatles, The Mamas and Papas and David Bowie.

On consecutive days at Woodbine, they ran the 3rd leg of the Triple Tiara for fillies and the 3rd leg of the Canadian Triple Crown. One went to the favourite, one went to a long-shot. We pay a sad farewell to trainer Ashlee Brnjas, who passed at 40. Conditioner Blake MacIntosh won a harness race for the 1,000th time and tells us about it. Jody Jamieson is always a good quote. He’s suffering from back pain and the pain of stewards, who are too quick to replace drivers who show up late. We have news of a nice honour for the legendary Sandy Hawley, who advises he may not be the most famous entity to come out of Oshawa. Also, Stakes races from Woodbine, Mohawk and Ajax Downs and a bizarre race at Mohawk in which two horses made disastrous breaks, only to come back and run 1-2.

The richest trot of the year in Canada – the Mohawk Million – is featured in this week’s podcast, along with several other harness racing and thoroughbred Stakes races. Leading jockey Kazushi Kimura came out of the weekend with a 25 race lead on Emma-Jayne Wilson. We talk with him and his agent Jordan Miller. What was it like for Brandon Greer to win the Ricoh Woodbine Mile with a horse he bred, owns and trains? We have the sensational finish to the Littler Brown Jug in Delaware, Ohio, and there was Canadian content in the Juggette. And they have right to be furious - bettors at Mohawk last week were cheated out of payoffs that they deserved.

Has horse racing in Ontario ever looked better? It was a week full of huge Stakes races – The Pattison International and the Ricoh Mile at Woodbine, the Canadian Trotting Classic and the Elegant Image among a buffet of Stakes races at Mohawk and the $400,000 Prince of Wales Stakes at Fort Erie. Kevin Attard and Gary Boulanger talk about winning the second jewel of the Triple Crown with Haddassah. We have Kathy Cecchin, the trainer of North America Cup champion Desperate Man and Kathy’s daughter Nikki Davies talking about their amazing win. Included in this podcast is a wrap of the weekly card at Ajax Downs, an insane sequence that produced two dead heats within 25 minutes on Racing Night Live and two consecutive races at Monticello Raceway that only Trump’s base could love. All of this plus Elvis and Prince.

The favourites were upset in the $1Million Pepsi North America Cup at Mohawk and the back story of the winner is wonderful. This podcast has a monster package of Stakes races from Mohawk and a few more of the thoroughbreds from Woodbine. Fort Erie’s Frank Salive handicaps the Prince of Wales Stakes and irrepressible trainer, Darryl Ezra, explains why his wild longshot just might win. Chantal Sutherland makes this podcast again, thanks to her 3 wins last Thursday. We’ve got the weekly wrap-up from Ajax Downs, a chat with 87 year-old Bill Megens, who we think is the oldest person ever to win a harness race in Canada, and a special guest appearance by Supertramp.

This podcast features millions of dollars of Stakes races Friday and Saturday at Mohawk. We find out from trainer Phil Serpe why Queen’s Plate Champion Safe Conduct won’t run in the Prince of Wales. There’s a great conversation with jockey Isabelle Wenc. She’s beaten the odds just to be a professional rider and most of her winners beat the odds as well. Her agent Alan Raymond tells us about her ‘impeccable’ work out routines. Garnet Barnsdale was at Clinton Raceway on Sunday. He saw Trevor Henry win the Drivers’ Charity Challenge and he also saw driver Natasha Day make history. Ever hear of a jockey getting punished for not using his whip enough? It happened in Singapore. And at The Meadowlands Friday night, Super Heroes and Villains battled for supremacy.

There was a huge Sunday card at Woodbine – 4 Stakes races, all for horses that went through the Canadian Thoroughbred Horse Society sales. And this came the day after Mohawk presented 7 Stakes races. All these in this podcast. Host Peter Gross speaks with Mitchell Kursner, who didn’t really think he was breeding a Queen’s Plate horse when he took his mare, Duchess Dancer to Bodemeister. We also have trainer Julia Carey, who inherited Safe Conduct for the Plate weekend when the horse’s trainer couldn’t make it. It was Essential Quality winning the Travers Stakes Saratoga and have you ever seen a horse try to bite a rival in a race? It happened during the stretch run of a $600,000 Stakes race, also at Saratoga. And when we heard that Tony Dandeo, an 86 year-old harness driver, won a race at Freehold, we got the race and his comments.

For the 1st time in 2 years, racing fans were allowed into Woodbine to watch the Queen’s Plate, all of them conducting themselves safely as they watched Safe Conduct and Irad Ortiz win the 162nd edition of the Plate. By a stroke of outrageous coincidence, Safe Conduct was actually the 2nd horse with that name to win a Stakes race last week. The other was a 2 year-old trotter at Mohawk. The Gold Cup and Saucer is the biggest harness race on Prince Edward Island and we treat you to the exhilarating Vance Cameron race call. This podcast is jammed with Stakes races from Woodbine, Mohawk and Ajax Downs and we probe the human side of versatile jockey, Ismael Mosqueira. And hang into to the end to hear the heroic act of a jockey who, in mid-race, abandoned any chance of winning to save another rider from certain disaster.

Canadian recording star Jim Cuddy headlines a star-studded cast in this podcast. Cuddy talks about performing at the Queen’s Plate and which of his songs may have horse racing themes. Mark Casse tells us about being inducted into the National Horse Racing Hall of Fame in Saratoga and about a childhood experience that changed the arc of his life. We gave Woodbine’s Jason Portuondo a budget of three words per horse to evaluate the entire potential field for next Sunday’s Queen’s Plate. Jennifer Morrison reveals fast times at Ajax High, trainer Daryl Ezra explains how he claimed a horse that finished 10th and turned it into a runaway winner, and just for some shadenfreude, we’ve got what we consider to be the worst horse race ever!