Grand River: Battle of the Belles goes to Wicked N Single

Monday afternoon's C$175,200 Battle of the Belles final for 2-year-old Ontario-sired pacing fillies at Grand River Raceway saw Wicked N Single and driver James MacDonald find the winner's circle after a second-place finish in their July 29 elimination.

The winner survived an inquiry about a possible pylon violation on the last turn as the judges ruled that Wicked N Single went inside one pylon, and hit the next, but no violation occurred. She stayed up for the biggest win of her career to date. In a separate inquiry, second-place finisher Manhattan Mayhem was ruled to have interfered with Wickedpace, so she was set back to third and Wickedpace moved up to second.

Famous Fast Words set the early pace for Travis Henry, but was overtaken by Wickedpace and Jody Jamieson before the 26 2/5 quarter. First-over Wicked N Single cleared Wickedpace soon after that point, leading to the half in 56 seconds flat. Manhattan Mayhem and driver Doug McNair tipped first-over from fourth on the second turn, gradually gaining ground on the outside until they reached Wicked N Single's sulky wheel at three-quarters, which was reached in 1:24 3/5.

MacDonald's filly held off late moves by Wickedpace, Manhattan Mayhem, and hard-charging Oneformybaby (Trevor Henry) in the stretch for the 1:53 2/5 victory.

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"I was sweating pretty bad. Everyone in the winner's circle here was celebrating and cheering, and then to have something like that happen, it puts a damper on the situation, for sure," MacDonald said about the inquiry. "I'm glad that it stood and they made the right call. I'm happy for the owners, the trainer and the horse herself, she earned it.

"I just kind took my time off the gate to see what was going to happen. Ideally I would've liked to have raced her off-the-pace because Tony and I have talked about tripping her out and she's gotten beat twice on the front-end. When you're racing for big money, you've got to see what the race gives you, and that's what the race was giving us today, so we kept trucking to the lead."

Wicked N Single is a McWicked filly out of Better Single, owned by Lisa Lefort of Waterdown, Ontario, and David Mercer of Westmount, Nova Scotia. She is trained by Anthony Beaton, who also shares breeder credits with Mercer.

"I certainly hope (there are good things ahead for Wicked N Single," remarked Beaton. "This is our first homebred baby. I've got to thank Winbak Farm for raising her. They did a tremendous job, and hopefully they do the same job with the full sister we're getting there this fall."

--edited press release (Grand River)--