Pocono: JK First Lady, Rocknificent to battle in final PA All-Stars event

The Downs at Mohegan Sun Pocono is proud to feature "the glamour division," the 3-year-old pacers, in the last two Pennsylvania All-Stars races of the year, with fillies going postward Saturday afternoon and colts taking to the track for the Sunday twilight card. There will be two $35,000 divisions of stakes performers in both contests.

The most hotly-anticipated of the races will be Saturday's tenth race, which will feature two superstar fillies, Rocknificent and JK First Lady, in a head-to-head challenge. These two were winners in Pennsylvania Sire Stakes competition at Philly nine days ago, with JK First Lady, to be driven by Andrew McCarthy for trainer Nancy Takter, rewriting the divisional track record to 1:49 2/5 using a powerful late kick, while Rocknificent, driven by Scott Zeron for trainer Linda Toscano, edging out 2019 divisional champ Lyons Sentinel in a stretch-long thriller, with the 1:50 2/5 mile featuring blistering back fractions of 53 2/5 - 26 1/5. Rocknificent has the post edge here, starting from the rail to JK First Lady's post six in a seven-horse field.

In the eleventh race division, no fewer than five of the seven entrants are coming off recent victories in the Pennsylvania Stallion Series – the fastest of those wins belonged to Marloe Hanover, who won in 1:50 4/5, a fifth of a second off the lifetime record she took at Pocono earlier this summer.

Sunday's action for colts and geldings finds Cattlewash starting from the rail in the tenth race section. The winner of $300,000+ at 2 seems to be coming into top form now, with a 1:50 1/5 Sire Stakes win here two back, followed up by a good second to the developing No Lou Zing. David Miller, the Hall of Famer who recently became the fifth North American driver to notch 13,000 career victories, is scheduled to pilot Cattlewash for Pocono's leading trainer, Ron Burke.

Drawing the rail in the fifth race All-Stars division is Barrage Hanover, who was second to Cattlewash in the recent Sire Stakes race and who also shows a Stallion Series win to his credit. Corey Callahan is down to drive the late-developing Barrage Hanover for trainer Chris Ryder. Tru Lou and Manticore also figure to have some say in this division.

The Saturday race card begins at 12:30 p.m.; Sunday's card has a 5 p.m. first post.

-edited release (Pocono/PHHA)