AJAX DOWNS RACING MONDAY OCT. 23 and ‘COUNTRY BOY’ DOES AJAX PROUD
There are just two Monday’s of Quarter Horse racing remaining at Ajax Downs for the 2017 season and plenty of action remaining.
Monday, October 23 has a 10-race card and one of the biggest battles will be for leading jockey.
Going into the last two days (Oct. 30 closes the season), Ramiro Castillo has 34 wins, just head of Cassandra Jeschke and Tony Phillips who are tied with 29 and Brian Bell, who has 28.
Jeschke won her 100th career race last Monday on A Splash of Royalty for Joe Tavares.
Among the featured races Oct. 23 is race eight, featuring the grey monster Albertt, recently a close second to champion Country Boy 123 in the Alex Picov Championship.
On track is the Farmer’s Market and in the VIP room, the final of the HANDICAPPING CONTEST for qualifiers from 3 previous contests.
The action should be sizzling on Monday!
Post time Monday is 12:55 p.m. You catch watch and wager at Ajax or through Horseplayer Interactive, www.hpibet.com.
And Country Boy 123 has returned to Ontario after a successful run in the $85,480 (US) Indiana Championship at Indiana Grand racetrack this past Saturday evening. Ajax Downs’ top older horse finished second in the 400-yard dash to top American speedster Apollitical Man.
Fresh off a hard fought win in the Alex Picov Championship on Oct. 9, Country Boy broke well and chased Apollitical Man all the way through the race and held off Stinkin Rich, a winner of his previous 6 races, to keep 2nd. His $17,000 plus earnings from the race pushed the 4-year-old’s career mark to over $180,000. He has almost $100,000 this year.
“We were very happy with him,” said owner Ruth Barbour. “There was a tough headwind of about 14 mph and the times of the races were slow.
Apollitical Man raced the 400 yards in 19.641 while the track’s record setter for the distance, Tommy the Train (his record is 19.324) won a stakes race later on the Indiana Grand card in :20.247.
Barbour said Country Boy 123 came out of the race well – “he was full of beans (Sunday) morning, he came roaring out of his stall.” The gelding will now rest this winter at her Grey Winds Farm in Hillsburgh and prepare for the 2018 season.
Country Boy 123, favoured to be named Ajax Downs’ Horse of the Year for the second consecutive season, is ranked #12 of over 4,400 older horses in North America by earnings in 2017.
Rank Horse Name Sts 1st 2nd 3rd Total $
Arctic Fame 8 6 0 1 $41,288
Free Thought 7 6 0 0 $23,022
Glittering Blue 9 6 0 1 $12,143
Bh Lisas Boy 5 5 0 0 $153,120
Country Boy 123 7 5 2 0 $99,017
Rock a Billy 9 5 0 0 $72,641
Rarin 8 5 1 0 $60,580 $7,573
Cruisinfourabruisin 10 5 2 1 $31,701
Katies Easy Moves 8 5 0 1 $28,296
Tickle Ur Fancy 7 5 0 1 $26,948
Wanna Be Fierce 8 5 0 1 $10,804
Vvr Calvin Labeck 9 5 0 1 $10,355