Saratoga Harness: Sears pilots Situationship, Wild Ticket to NYSS victories

Driver Brian Sears was victorious with two Chapter Seven colts - Situationship and Wild Ticket - in the New York Sire Stakes for 2-year-old male trotters on Friday evening at Saratoga Casino Hotel.

The first group went for a purse of $75,900, and Situationship got away in second behind Titan Your Grip (Mark MacDonald), but Sears brought his charge to the outside heading to the 28 second opening quarter and cleared Titan Your Grip for the top spot passing that marker. After taking command, Situationship kept it through a 56 3/5 half and 1:27 three-quarters on his way to a 1 3/4 length victory in 1:56 2/5. Titan Your Grip was the runner-up and Nottingham (Marcus Miller) collected third.

Ake Svanstedt trains Situationship, who was bred by Crawford Farms and sold for $85,000 at last year's Lexington Selected Yearling Sale, for owners Knutsson Trotting Inc., Little E LLC. and Tomas Andersson. Situationship broke his maiden in his third attempt, has now earned $55,440 and paid $5.30 to win as the second choice.

Wild Ticket and Sears put up fractions of 28 4/5, 58 3/5 and 1:28 4/5 in the other $74,500 flight and then cruised home in 28 2/5 to defeat Bargain (Wally Hennessey) by 8 3/4 lengths in a 1:57 1/5 mile. Seven Minute Abs (Miller) finished third.

► Sign up for our FREE DRF Harness Digest Newsletter

A Marcus Melander trainee bred by Al Libfeld and purchased for $200,000 at the 2022 Lexington Selected Yearling Sale, Wild Ticket is onwed by AMG Stable Inc., Kenneth Kjellgren, Heights Stable and Mantorp LLC. Wild Ticket has compiled a record of 2-0-1 from three appearances, pushed his bankroll to $73,776 and returned $2.40 to win as the 1-5 favorite.