Jay's Table - Mare Pace
bay mare, 6, by Run The Table -- Jay’s Omaha, by Armbro Omaha
Owners
Siegel, Scharf, d'Elegance & TLP Stables
The Breeders Crown is often the only event that brings the top pacing mares from every part of North America together on the racetrack. 1998 was no different, as slowly word began to drift back to the host track of the Meadowlands about this mare or that, from Ontario or Ohio, who was tearing up the competition. After the 1996 Crown victory of Indiana import Extreme Velocity, a little more respect was given to the out-of-town interlopers, but generally the Meadowlands fans and analysts stuck by the familiar.
The eleven mares entered ranged from the sensational Sanabelle Island to the supplemented Jules Jodoin, who had found new life in her fourth year of racing for the Joe Anderson stable. From Indiana came Miss Kitty Hanover and Shania, hoping to replicate the success of Extreme Velocity, who entered the Crown winner circle via Hoosier Park. Leading owner Bob Glazer salted the field with two of his Peter Pan stable mares, Keep Your Pans Off and One If By Pan, and Meadowlands open-ranked regulars Western Azure, Dragon So and Cami Whitestocking were representing the home team.
From Canada came the indomitable mare Oohs’ N Aah’s, making her third start in the profitable Breeders Crown program and Jay’s Table, a six-year-old homebred owned by Ontario native Joe Leonardis. One could forgive Leonardis for thinking of the Breeders Crown as a bad dream. In 1996, with Jay’s Table, one of the top pacing mares in the country in his barn, he missed the entry date for the $282,500 event. He had to watch the mare contentedly munching hay in her stall as Extreme Velocity and John Campbell blazed to the Breeders Crown winner circle. Leonardis admits to some sleepless nights over his error, and then finally was able to put it behind him as something that “wasn’t meant to be.
” After all, his homebred daughter of Run The Table (best remembered for his incredible duels with Jate Lobell at The Meadowlands, and as the second place finisher to Call For Rain in the 1987 Breeders Crown, now a super successful Ontario stallion) and the Armbro Omaha mare Jay’s Omaha owed him nothing.
Unraced at two, Jay’s Table made just 16 starts at three, mostly in overnight and Ontario Sire Stake contests. At four, chronic foot problems kept her off the track, but when capable of racing, she flashed the promise Leonardis knew she was in her. With her decent record, Jay’s Table could have retired then as a blue chip broodmare.
Instead she was just beginning to show her brilliance. As a five-year-old, Jay’s Table won 9 of 20 races, was on the board 15 times, and missed checks just twice in 1997. Adding to Leonardis frustration in missing the Breeders Crown box, Jay’s Table went on a three-race tear after the event had been raced without her, beating many of the same mares in the first two legs of the Roses Are Red before finishing second to Mystical Maddy in the final. Leonardis was left to wonder what might have been. In 1998 he found out.
Jay’s Table started out 1998 in January for regular OJC trainer Jim Kerr. With her chronically bad feet, she faltered at first, but by February was back to winning in Open company as she pleased. She dropped her mark to 1:53.1 at Mohawk, and was sharp as a tack through April and May, winning five straight times. By late July, Jay’s Table’s hoofs were in good shape and Leonardis had probably circled the entry date for the Breeders Crown on every calendar in the house, barn and office.
There was one problem. Jim Kerr didn’t want to leave the stable and go to the Meadowlands, and suggested Leonardis send her to one of the top outfits in New Jersey. Leonardis chose Nat Varty, a trainer for the Bill Robinson Stable. He’d has great success sending another mare, Miatross, to them to race at the Big M, and agreed with Kerr that sending her down to them was the best thing.
Trainer | Driver
Monte Gelrod | Luc Ouellette
It was the first time in her four-year racing career that Jay’s Table had ventured out of Ontario. Still, Leonardis was shocked to see her made 15-1 on the morning line for the Breeders Crown. After all, she had the rail and the services of John Campbell, who had no fewer than 31 Breeders Crown trophies on his shelves. Leonardis also remembers Campbell asking him if his mare could leave, and him replying that she could, but was actually better from off the pace, and whatever happened -- don’t hit her. That’s some strong advice to the leading driver in the country, in a race like the Breeders Crown, but to his credit Campbell took it.
Western Azure was sent off the lukewarm favorite, with sentiment ranging across the field. Only Ooh’s N Aah’s, and the Peter Pan stable entry reached double digits. Even Jay’s Table was reconsidered from her morning line odds and was about 7-1. Sanabelle Island had been scratched due to her sub-par performance in the Breeders Crown prep race. Trainer driver Steve Warrington knew his mare was ailing after the race and decided to give her some rest and relaxation.
It was the hotheaded Dragon So who shot out of the gate first, with Western Azure in torrid pursuit. The pair took the field to the half in :54.4. Campbell had gotten away fourth, reserved Jay’s Table off the pace and tipped her out for the drive with the confidence of a man with the best horse. She did not disappoint -- she never has -- and streaked home for a two length victory over Jules Jodoin and Western Azure.
Leonardis remembers running up the track to embrace his mare, the driver, the groom, the winners circle attendant -- whoever crossed his path -- and thought the 1:49 he saw on the tote board was the time of day on that August afternoon. Blinking in the sunlight he squinted and realized it the time of the race, and his six-year-old homebred mare had just paced a mile in a world record 1:49.3!
To prove her Breeders Crown effort was no fluke, Leonardis left Jay’s Table at the Meadowlands for the next week. She raced and won, in the same fashion, in 1:50.1. Then Leonardis took his champion and went home.
Jay’s Table went back to Jim Kerr and continued to win. She won a leg of the Roses Are Red and was fifth in the final. Her foot problems flared up again, and she got some well-deserved time off. In early December she qualified again, and by year’s end had won an incredible 13 times in 28 starts, was the richest pacing mare of her peers (and only Red Bow Tie, Pacific Fella and Noble Ability out-earned her among the boys) and stood as the fastest female pacer of all time, an all-age world record holder. Year end honors on both sides of the border were a cinch. Jay’s Table and Joe Leonardis got the respect they deserved.
Purse $282,500
Meadowlands Racetrack, East Rutherford, New Jersey August 1, 1998
Extras
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