The Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame is pleased to name three people and three horses to be inducted as the Hall’s Class of 2021. As previously announced, the Board of Directors agreed to reduce the number of inductees for the Class of 2021 to three per breed. This will allow for the 2020 and 2021 inductees to be properly recognized together, once a gala event may be hosted.
The Hall determined additional inductees will be added in 2022 and 2023 to offset the smaller class of 2021.
Being recognized as a Thoroughbred Builder Inductee in 2021 is Montreal-born and Streetsville, Ontario resident Victoria (Vicki) Pappas, making her the third woman to be inducted to the CHRHF in as many years. Throughout a career spanning over 40 years, Pappas has been engaged in various elements of the Canadian Thoroughbred industry, starting first as a groom, she has also been a trainer, owner and breeder. In 2006 Edenwold, bred by Pappas along with her husband Bill Diamant and long-time friend Gail Wood, won the Queen’s Plate.
As the face of the Woodbine Sales Company, Vicki was involved in all aspects of the sale. As one of the first on-camera hosts for Woodbine’s expanded simulcast show, Vicki handicapped races on air. And as Woodbine’s stakes coordinator, Vicki worked tirelessly to encourage some of the world’s top horsepeople and horses to make the trip to Woodbine for major races.
Vicki may however be best known as the passionately dedicated and hands-on chairperson of LongRun Thoroughbred Retirement Society. Under Vicki’s leadership, what began as a few people looking for ways to ensure Thoroughbred racehorses have a dignified and happy retirement, has grown into a registered charity, recognized as one of the continent’s most respected horse retirement and adoption organizations and is also the first industry-funded adoption program in Canada. To date, LongRun has successfully retired and adopted over 1,000 racehorses, and continues to care for 50 horses on its farm in Hillsburgh, Ontario. Many of the farm’s resident equines are ‘lifers’ who will comfortably live out their days under the care of LongRun.
Bred by Darrell Bauder’s Alberta-based Red Hawk Ranch and foaled in Ontario, the 2021 Thoroughbred Male Horse Inductee Heart to Heart was a $25,000 purchase by Lethbridge, Alberta’s Terry Hamilton at the CTHS yearling sale in 2012. That investment proved lucrative with the horse earning over $2 Million (US) in a high-profile seven year racing career which included 15 wins and nearly $50,000 per start in 41 starts.
As a two-year-old, the son of English Channel out of the Silver Deputy daughter Ask the Question, made starts in both Canada and the U.S. His Canadian starts included a third place finish in the Vandal Stakes as well as finishing fourth in both the Simcoe Stakes and Coronation Futurity. Following his sophomore year which included finishing third in the Toronto Cup Stakes as well as starts in the Queen’s Plate and Marine Stakes, Heart to Heart was named the Sovereign Award Champion 3-Year-Old in 2014, on the merits of winning 4 of 8 races, including two Grade 3 scores at Churchill Downs.
Trained throughout his career by Brian Lynch, Heart to Heart won two Grade 1 races back-to-back in 2018 with a victory in the Gulfstream Park Turf in February of that year, followed by a decisive win in the Makers 46 Mile in April at Keeneland.
In total, Heart to Heart was victorious in 11 graded stakes at US tracks, including Belmont, Monmouth, Saratoga, and aforementioned Churchill Downs, Gulfstream Park, and Keeneland. During his seven year career, this Canadian bred and owned horse had triple-digit (100+) Beyer speed figures 18 times with 10 of his stakes wins achieved in gate-to-wire fashion. Impressively, he also had at least one graded stakes win each year from age three through age seven.
Bred and owned by Conn Smythe (CHRHF Class of 1977), and trained by D. P. (Donnie) Walker, 2021 Thoroughbred Veteran Inductee Not Too Shy won just two races in her initial year of racing (1968) but, in the next three years she would establish herself as one of the top stakes-winning fillies of her era. A 1966 daughter of Nearctic out of Twice Shy, she withstood a hard campaign in her sophomore year, going to the post 19 times.
Included in her accomplishments were victories in the Fury, Wonder Where, Maple Leaf, and Duchess Stakes, a race in which she defeated Kentucky Oaks winner, Hail to Patsy. Not Too Shy would lose the 1969 Canadian Oaks by a head to Kinghaven Farm’s Cool Mood (inducted in 2014) after a long stretch duel. However, these two fillies would battle three more times with Not Too Shy prevailing in each of those meetings to avenge her Oaks’ setback. Later that year, she took on the boys in the Breeders’ Stakes, finishing in third place.
Often racing against older males, and equally adept on both dirt and turf, Not Too Shy’s 4-yr-old season included 15 starts with wins in the Seaway, Canadian, Belle Mahone, Maple Leaf (again) and Tattling Handicap. Not Too Shy, described as a big, strapping bay filly, was named Canada’s Champion Older Filly of 1970 for her efforts at age four.
At age five, she continued to race at a high level, earning 6 wins in 14 starts with victories in the Whimsical, repeating in the Seaway Stakes and a 4th-place finish against top fillies and mares in the Susquehanna Hcp at Liberty Bell in Philadelphia. Not Too Shy retired with 11 stakes victories among her 23 wins. Her breeding career produced multiple stakes winner and 1978 Queen’s Plate contender, Lucky Colonel S.
The Standardbred Election Committee inductee selections for 2021 include Builder Jim Bullock, Driver Randy Waples, and Female Horse Great Memories.
The Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame congratulates all of this year’s inductees and their connections. For more information about the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame, please visit www.canadianhorseracinghalloffame.com.
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