Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame nominees include Breeders' Cup Mile winner Tepin

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - The Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame has announced that 30 people and horses, 15 from the Thoroughbred world and 15 from the Standardbred sport, have been selected to appear on the 2020 Hall of Fame voting ballot. A 20-person election committee for each breed will determine the recipients in their respective categories, and the results will be announced April 7.

The Thoroughbred builder ballot is made up of Charles Fipke, Philip Kives, and Sue Leslie.

Fipke bred and owned three Sovereign Award winners, including 2008 champion male 3-year-old Not Bourbon, a Queen’s Plate winner. He also campaigned Perfect Shirl, who was a longshot winner of the 2011 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf.

The late Kives owned and bred horses who won multiple stakes at Assiniboia Downs, including two Manitoba Derby winners.

Leslie, an owner-trainer in Ontario for over 30 years, is the longtime president of the Ontario HBPA. In 2011, she was honoured with a special Sovereign Award for her lifetime work in racing.

Gary Boulanger, Richard Dos Ramos, and Irwin Driedger have been selected to appear on the jockey ballot.

Edmonton-born Boulanger won multiple riding titles at Longacres and Calder in the 1990s. He captured the 2000 Queen’s Plate and Canadian Oaks on Dancethruthedawn, and gave Moonlit Beauty a masterful winning ride in the Grade 3 Maple Leaf in 2013. Through 2019, he had won 3,623 races, including 232 stakes, for earnings of $80 million.

Dos Ramos annexed back-to-back Sovereign Awards for top apprentice in 1981-82. The native of Trinidad and Tobago orchestrated two massive upset scores in 1992 on Benburb, in the Grade 2 Molson Export Million and Prince of Wales Stakes. He also took the 1999 Canadian International on Thornfield. Prior to his retirement in 2013, Dos Ramos won 2,159 races, including 148 stakes, for earnings of nearly $61 million.

Manitoba native Irwin Driedger was a perennial leading rider at Assiniboia Downs before relocating to Woodbine in the 1980s. He won the 1981 Sovereign Award for outstanding jockey, and was the regular rider of 1985 Canadian Horse of the Year Imperial Choice. Upon his retirement in 1990, he had won 1,633 races, including 83 stakes, for earnings of nearly $15 million.

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The trainers on ballot are Mike Keogh, Jerry Lavigne, and Danny Vella.

Keogh won the 1999 Queen’s Plate with Woodcarver, and the 2003 Canadian Triple Crown with the popular Wando. Perhaps his most important victory came when Langfuhr captured the Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap at Belmont in 1997.

The late Lavigne won 68 stakes, which included Queen’s Plate triumphs with Almoner in 1970 and Son of Briartic in 1982. He also conditioned Canadian champion 3-year-old Nice Dancer, and the gifted grass runner Lost Majorette.

Vella was the Sovereign Award winner in 1994-95 while training for Stronach Stables. He notched the Queens Plate twice, with Basqueian in 1994 and Strait of Dover in 2012. He has accumulated 137 stakes victories.

In the Thoroughbred Female Horse category, voters will select from Hard Not to Like, Marketing Mix, and Tepin.

The Grade 1-winning turf runner Hard Not to Like earned over $1.2 million on the strength of eight stakes successes.

Ontario-bred Marketing Mix banked over $2 million and won a host of graded stakes, most notably the Grade 1 Rodeo Drive in 2012.

Tepin beat the boys in both the 2015 Breeders’ Cup Mile and the 2016 Woodbine Mile. A trip across the pond in June 2016 resulted in a gutsy score in the Group 1 Queen Anne Stakes at Royal Ascot. She was the Eclipse Award-winning turf female in 2015 and 2016.

The Thoroughbred Veteran Horse category is made up of Bold Executive, Formal Gold, and Play the King.

Coronation Futurity victor Bold Executive was Canada’s leading sire six times between 2001-2012. He sired the millionaire Sand Cove.

Ontario-bred Formal Gold, a Grade 1 winner in New York, was the fastest Canadian-bred ever from a Beyer Speed Figure perspective. Fifth in the 1996 Breeders’ Cup Classic at Woodbine, he was standing at stud in Alberta prior to his death in 2018.

The late bloomer Play the King was arguably the greatest Canadian sprinter of all time. He was voted Canada’s Horse of the Year in 1988, after ending up second in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Churchill.

The Standardbred people on the ballot are drivers Paul MacDonell, Ed Tracey, and Randy Waples; and trainers John Bax, Jack Darling, and Ben Wallace.

The Standardbred horses up for consideration in three different categories are Amour Angus, Great Memories, West Of L A, Majestic Son, McWicked, Shadow Play, B Cor Tamara, Rambling Willie, and Western Dreamer.