Harness Racing: Brett Miller gets win 6,000

Brett Miller notched career win 6,000 when he piloted They Call Me Moon to victory, by disqualification, in Tuesday’s first race at The Meadows.

They Call Me Moon and Miller finished second but were awarded the milestone victory when the apparent winner, TSM Artist Star B, was set back for interference on the backside. Miller earned career win 6,001 the traditional way later in the card.

Miller, 39, was born into a harness racing family. His grandfathers, A.J. Price and Clyde Miller, operated stables, and his father, Del S. Miller, is a successful trainer/driver. For all that, the sport nearly lost young Brett to carpentry, a trade he studied at Ravenna (Ohio) High School.

“I actually was building houses,” he said in a 2010 interview. “I nearly went that route, but once I started driving horses in matinees and qualifiers, there was no turning back.”

He launched his career as a trainer/driver in Ohio, operating a stable of 15, but found training much less appealing than driving or carpentry.

“I never had an owner who paid on time, and I never had an owner who would give me more than $3,000 for a horse,” he said. “So I quit training to focus on driving and got my big break when the late Northfield Park trainer John Lee started naming me.”

Miller is based at The Meadows but also performs on the Grand Circuit and at Kawartha Downs when he and his wife Stacey visit her family in Peterborough, Ontario. He considers his 2001 triumph with Strong Scooter in the Senior Jug for trainer Carl Conte, Jr. among his most important victories.

“It isn’t the biggest purse I ever won, but it was my first drive for an East Coast trainer and owner,” he said.

-edited release (Meadows)