Mountaineer: Favorites take both stakes
Out-of-town horses, both of whom were favored, won the holiday turf stakes at Mountaineer Park.
La Reine's Terms ($3.80), a 7-year-old trained by Maryland-based Lawrence Murray and ridden by Delaware Park regular Jeremy Rose, scored his fourth straight stakes win in the $75,000 Labor Day Handicap. He covered a mile over firm turf in 1:33.49 and finished 2 3/4 lengths in front of Magical Madness.
La Reine's Terms is now 12 for 32 lifetime with earnings of more than $445,000. He has won five of his last six starts dating back to September 2001.
In the co-featured $75,000 Summer Finale Handicap for fillies and mares, La Recherche ($7), a Kentucky-based filly trained by Tom Amoss and ridden by Eddie Martin, prevented Murray and Rose from sweeping both stakes. She defeated the Murray-trained Media Access by 1 1/2 lengths and was timed in 1:34.72 for the mile.
La Recherche's victory, her seventh in 19 lifetime starts, came after she disappointed as the heavy favorite in the West Virginia President's Cup in her previous start at Mountaineer.