Harness: Ducharme eyeing New York-Massachusetts Sire Stakes sweep

It's been 10 years since trainer George Ducharme found himself in the winner's circle at the Meadowlands, having captured the Hambletonian with Royalty For Life on an August afternoon where his colt won both elimination and final on the same day.

"It set my career on a new course," said Ducharme. "I got recognized and started attracting owners that wanted to buy stakes horses."

Times have changed since then for Ducharme, who still operates a relatively small stable with just 25 in training, but stakes are still on his mind, and he gears his 2- and 3-year-olds for battle with mostly Sire Stakes on the schedule.

Since 2013, the racing canvas has changed and fortunately for Ducharme, a long-time Massachusetts resident, the opportunity in his home state has allowed for a massive shift in his racing operation and an interest in remaining in-state for lucrative races programmed at Plainridge Park.

"It's a great place for us to race," said Ducharme of the five-eighths-mile track. "The best part is, as a resident, we're allowed to keep a horse in a non-winners race for extra starts."

That program lets Ducharme and other residents race in non-winners of one company even after the horse has won two starts, thus providing an opportunity to learn and earn for Ducharme's youngsters.

Even greater than the overnight program for Ducharme is the Sire Stakes program that's worth roughly $400,000 for each division and doesn't begin until neighboring states Sire Stakes program have already concluded.

"You have to have a mare residing in the state in December prior to the year of foaling, and she must foal within the state," said Ducharme. "I'm racing a lot more homebreds these days."

While Massachusetts may be on the map for down the road, Ducharme is currently enjoying a solid season on the New York Sire Stakes front and will enter two freshmen in championship events at Yonkers scheduled for September 9, the same afternoon of the $1 million MGM Yonkers International Trot. Keep Asking, a son of Chapter Seven that Ducharme not only co-owns but bred along with his partners, has emerged over the last month and ended the Sire Stakes preliminary as the leading point earner in the 2-year-old colt and gelding trot division.

"I raced her mother in the New York Sire Stakes and we bred her," said Ducharme about the Muscle Mass-sired Sensibility, who earned over $361K during her racing career. Keep Asking is her first foal. The mare did qualify for both New York Sire Stakes finals as a 2 and 3-year-old in 2018-19 and finished third on both occasions.

"She was a pretty laid-back mare," said Ducharme, "And he [Keep Asking] is pretty laid-back as well."

While the dam wore trotting hobbles through her career, her first born does not, and Ducharme recalls that he put the hobbles on her just to be safe on the half-mile tracks.

As for Keep Asking, the colt caught the attention of everyone a few weeks ago at Vernon Downs when Ducharme called in a trotting expert driver, none other than three-time Hambletonian winner Scott Zeron to sit behind Keep Asking.

"I really thought he was a nice colt, and I asked Scottie to drive him just to see if I was right about him," said Ducharme.

Sent off as a rank 23-1 outsider in a single $108,200 New York Sire stakes division at on August 18, Zeron took Keep Asking to the back of the seven-horse field and allowed the favorites to do much of the heavy lifting as a 55-second opening-half was cut out while Keep Asking trailed the field.

Still fifth and more than five lengths off at the three-quarters, Zeron tipped Keep Asking to the far outside. The colt made up ground impressively with each stride and flew by the field to win by a couple of lengths in a career-best 1:54 clocking. A 28-second final quarter did the job and put the colt on the map.

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This past Monday (August 28), with a final spot still in question, Keep Asking again got the chance to race for six figures in a single division at Monticello. With Jordan Stratton in the bike, they made easy work of the field while coasting to a 1:59 victory in the process.

"I don't tell the drivers what to do," said Ducharme. "He was the favorite so I knew Jordan would drive him accordingly."

The last two wins by Keep Asking are his only ones of the year, but Ducharme had plenty of confidence before those races.

"His first start at Yonkers [June 22] he made a break at the start, then came back to finish second, and Yannick [Gingras] told me he was very good," said Ducharme. "Actually, I think his best race may have been at Batavia [July 26] where he was roaring by horses in the stretch and finished third."

Ducharme likes the conservative approach when it comes to his 2-year-olds, and when reflecting on the off-the-pace antics of Keep Asking he stated the obvious, "When you draw outside on a half-mile track in these Sire Stakes you really have to bomb out of there to get the front, and it's just not worth it," Ducharme said.

With but six starts this year and getting better in each one Ducharme is looking forward not just to the September 9 New York Day of Champions program but further down the road.

"He's got the Mass Stakes as well, and I think there are only about 25 eligible to those races," said Ducharme.

The first leg of the Massachusetts Sire Stakes begins on September 26 and the final is scheduled for October 24.

"We've kept him eligible to the major 3-year-old stakes," said Ducharme when looking ahead to 2024 for Keep Asking. "We'll get together after this season and decide what to do about next year."

No matter how this year ends for Keep Asking it will be a tough decision for the owners to stake him more liberally on the Grand Circuit, just considering how much he could race for in New York and Massachusetts and likely face significantly weaker fields.

Ducharme will have a nice pacing colt in the New York Sire Stakes championship final by the name of Ameritric. A winner of $50K this year in just six career starts, Ameritric is a son of American Ideal from the 100 percent producing dam Electric Fool. The dam is a half-sister to the $1.2 million winner Western Shore.

"He was pretty good in his last start at Yonkers, closing to finish third," said Ducharme of the effort on August 22. Though winless on the season Ameritric qualified in 1:56 3/5 in June at Ducharme's base of operations Vernon Downs.

Ducharme will also have four horses in the Excelsior finals and noted that all are dual-eligible to the Massachusetts program.

Whether the Hambletonian will be on Ducharme's schedule in 2024, the conditioner has developed a solid stable and expects more homebred dual-breds to fill his stalls next year.