Meadowlands: Could it all come down to the FanDuel Open Trot?

While the slogan suggests "It all comes down to the Breeders Crown," the final word in the campaign for Trotter of the Year and perhaps even Horse of the Year could come down to the results this Saturday night. The $300,000 FanDuel Championship for Open Trotters, carded as race five at the Meadowlands, is a virtual match race been two of the most dynamic 4-year-old trotters that sport has seen in the same year in over a generation.

Breeders Crown winner On To Norway may not have danced every dance, as they say, but he has shown dominance when it mattered most. His epic performance in the Crown on October 24 at Scioto Downs showed that he could take air, race parked the mile, navigate a five-eighths-mile track and trot faster than any horse of his generation. MGM Yonkers International Trot and Maple Leaf Trot champion Super Chapter seemed invincible for a long stretch of the season, but that dominance came to a grinding halt when put to the test in the Breeders Crown. The two will likely settle the score in Saturday's contest, which is most certain to be the final time they will ever meet, with the stallion Super Chapter arriving at Hanover Shoe Farms next year and the gelding On To Norway likely to return in search of the next chapter to his incredible story.

First, for the record, On To Norway has a distinct advantage in head-to-head matchups with Super Chapter. The two battled epically in July, first in the Graduate Series final on July 4 at the Meadowlands where a deft steer by Yannick Gingras put On To Norway in perfect position to go by Super Chapter in the final strides of a 1:48 3/5 mile, winning by a neck in the process.

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The two returned seven days later, and the matchup was decidedly different, as Gingras put On To Norway on the front-end and gamely held off the determined challenge of Super Chapter in the Hambletonian Maturity at a mile and an eighth. The added distance was not an impediment to either, with a neck once again the decision maker.

The two rivals parted ways following the races restricted to just 4-year-olds in East Rutherford, New Jersey, and that's where Super Chapter went on to garner the most attention. Meanwhile, On To Norway retreated to Indiana where he continued to march to his own drum and do what has come more naturally to him than any other trotter in recent memory, which is, to quote the late Al Davis, "just win, baby."

Super Chapter, by that definition, had to navigate against many of his elders and was dominant in the process, annexing the Cashman Memorial on Hambletonian Day, then the Maple Leaf Trot, followed by the $1 million MGM Yonkers International Trot. By the time the Breeders Crown rolled around, those two second-place finishes behind On To Norway became a distant memory, and Super Chapter would gain some measure of revenge in capturing the $250,000 Dayton Trotting Derby on October 17 in an eye-popping 1:50 2/5 mile that gave an aura of invincibility to his resume heading into the Breeders Crown. The break in stride by On To Norway in the Dayton Derby did not tarnish Super Chapter's victory, but when On To Norway made another rare break in stride six days later in an Indiana Sire Stakes final at Harrah's Hoosier Park (though he would recover to win the race), it appeared to indicate that everything was not going as smoothly as it often had for On To Norway.

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Neither horse drew particularly well in the $600,000 Grade 1 Breeders Crown event, with On To Norway, now driven by Ronnie Wrenn Jr., starting from post seven and Super Chapter landing post eight. When it came to the wagering, all recollection of On To Norway's dramatic victories at the Meadowlands during the summer had appeared to vanish completely. The betting public saw a white-hot Super Chapter as a near certainty, backing him to 9-10 favoritism despite the outside draw and a few notable speed horses to his inside flank. On To Norway, heading into the Crown, had only lost twice in his first 14 races, and on both occasions they were over five-eighths-mile tracks where he broke in stride. The first came in the Charlie Hill Memorial over the Scioto Downs surface where an early break took him out of the $250,000 contest. He made a massive recovery for driver Yannick Gingras to finish second, but Emoticon Legacy's stunning 1:50 2/5 mile made that 4-year-old a more distinct rival to Super Chapter.

Thus, On To Norway went into the Crown as a 13-1 outsider. Obviously, the fact that he had made breaks in three of his last four starts, with two of them coming over five-eighths-mile tracks, had much to do with the public's loss of faith. That said, On To Norway kept his composure and his stride in the Breeders Crown, and while others duked it out in a stunningly quick opening-half, the 4-year-old by Muscle Massive was rated nicely by Wrenn Jr. in the early stages, and then went past Super Chapter with ease. That On To Norway also held off Emoticon Legacy late was another feather in his cap and a true testament to why this horse has won 40 of 49 lifetime starts, with 36 wins in his last 40 starts.

Heading into Saturday's contest, On To Norway clearly has the edge in overall number of wins, as well as head-to-head wins against Super Chapter. On To Norway has six more starts than Super Chapter as well. Super Chapter leads in Grade 1 wins, having captured the Cashman, International and Maple Leaf, while On To Norway owns two Grade 1 wins with the Breeders Crown and Hambletonian Maturity to his credit.

On Saturday trainer Ron Burke will send out On To Norway (post two) and Lexus Kody (post seven) in the FanDuel Championship. Trainer Marcus Melander has two of his own in the field with Aetos Kronos S (post one) on the inside track and Super Chapter (post four) in the middle of the starting car.

Following his Breeders Crown triumph, On To Norway prepped for the FanDuel final with a win at Harrah's Hoosier Park in an Open event on November 7. Super Chapter was also in action a week ago, winning a qualifying race at the Meadowlands in 1:52 2/5 for driver Dexter Dunn.

Though Saturday's Meadowlands program features a wide array of stakes events, it's hard to say any of the other stakes races has as much riding on the outcome as the FanDuel Open Trot.