Breeders Crown: Horse of the Year could be on the line for Lyons Sentinel

What a difference a year makes. For Lyons Sentinel, the current front-runner in 2021 polling for harness Horse of the Year, her 4-year-old season has been magical, as the daughter of Captaintreacherous has been dominant against her class and has elevated her stature with each major stakes victory. Her driver Tim Tetrick has been with her for all three years on the track but honestly needed some convincing early on.

As a 2-year-old in 2019, Lyons Sentinel was up against Rocknificent in a Pennsylvania Sire Stakes race, and Tetrick opted off her to drive Rocknificent.

"At the time I was driving a lot of horses for Linda (Toscano)," said Tetrick, recalling his decision. "Rocknificent was and still is a very good horse."

Lyons Sentinel would win that race and eventually Tetrick landed in the right sulky seat.

"If you notice, I was driving her [Lyons Sentinel] at the end of the year," he said.

After an epic 2-year-old season, the Jim King Jr.-trained Lyons Sentinel would find the sledding a bit more uncomfortable during her sophomore season.

"She just couldn't beat Chris [Ryder's] filly," said Tetrick in blunt terms. "I mean she cut a (1):49 mile in the Jugette with a 26 last quarter and still got beaten by Party Girl Hill. That shows you how great that filly was."

Indeed, Party Girl Hill was a thorn in Lyons Sentinel's side all through 2020, and now that she's off to a second career as a broodmare, Lyons Sentinel has not only prospered but profited, with a potential to garner honors many thought Party Girl Hill had rightfully earned last year.

Horsemen often talk about horses' intelligence out on the racetrack. Was it possible that Lyons Sentinel was smart enough to know that Party Girl Hill was the better horse?

"I think they're smart and know when they've done something good," said Tetrick. "I think when they win, they can have their confidence boosted."

Conversely, perhaps when they continue to lose to the same horse it can become a learning experience, limiting their confidence to go past or hold off a superior horse.

Greatness is a term quite overused in our times, but Tetrick and Lyons Sentinel obviously knew what they were up against last year, and no matter how determined the filly was, the obstacle was too great. What's fascinating a year later is just how good Lyons Sentinel has been while facing older foes and how much better she has gotten over the course of the year.

"I think the biggest difference with her from a 2-year-old until now is that she's learned to race on the front- end," said Tetrick. "That's something she just couldn't do as a 2-year-old. I would try to trip her out."

Lyons Sentinel will enter the Breeders Crown riding a seven-race winning streak and an overall record of nine wins in 15 starts while not missing the board. She qualified on October 15 at the Meadowlands with Tetrick getting her to the half in 59 flat and then sprinting a 54 1/5 final half for a comfortable score. Her most recent stakes victory was an overpowering 1:48 2/5 effort in the Dayton Distaff Derby on October 2 over the Ohio five-eighths-mile track.

While everything has gone perfectly for Lyons Sentinel over her most recent form spree, Tetrick could not follow the mare to Canada for the Milton stakes eliminations on September 17, and that could have made things difficult for any driver not aware of the antics of the mare before a race.

For those who haven't seen it in person, Lyons Sentinel comes on the track and for quite some time seems incapable of hitting a pace.

"She's been doing that since the first time I sat behind her as a 2-year-old," said Tetrick of a habit that's been hard to break. "I told Jimmy (MacDonald) about that before he drove her in the Milton and said not to worry, that she'll switch over to a pace before the race starts."

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MacDonald managed to guide Lyons Sentinel to a 1:49 victory over the Woodbine Mohawk Park surface that night but not without some personal agitation.

"He told me he was sh**ting himself before the race," said Tetrick of the conversation he had with MacDonald.

Tetrick would put Lyons Sentinel on the front past the half in the Milton final on September 25, adding another stakes victory to her resume.

Lyons Sentinel's stakes season was perfect north of the border, with a 1:49 1/5 victory in the Roses Are Red on September 4 completing a three-race streak, and that likely would come as no surprise to anyone that's looked closely at the maternal side of her pedigree. She is the fifth foal out of the Western Ideal-sired dam Tutu Hanover, whose first five foals were all fillies. Tutu Hanover earned $117K as a racehorse with a 1:52 mark and was the eighth foal, ironically the first filly, out of the $1 million-winning Tricky Tooshie.

Lyons Sentinel appears to be following a similar race-arc to her grand dam, a top-flight performer as a 2- and 3-year-old in Quebec and Ontario who later went on to a solid career as a pacing mare on the Woodbine-Mohawk circuit. Tricky Tooshie was by far the richest son or daughter of Rumpus Hanover, a stallion that spent his first two years in Ontario before moving to Quebec.

Two years ago, Tetrick was the primary pilot behind Horse of the Year Shartin N and now finds himself in a similar spot entering the final weeks of the stakes season. Both mares were trained by King Jr., but that's where the similarities end.

"They are nothing like each other," said Tetrick when asked to compare. "Shartin N wanted to be on the front-end all the time, and you had to struggle at times to keep her from getting there."

As for Lyons Sentinel?

"She can get very lazy on the lead and likes to chase," said Tetrick.

The Breeders Crown results will go a long way towards determining this year's top trotter or pacer, but Lyons Sentinel, who turned down a bye into the final and will race in her Breeders Crown elimination on Saturday at the Meadowlands (race 11), has proven over three years of battling with the best that she'd be most fitting of the title.