by Thomas Hedlund

One of the most pleasant V75 days in Sweden during the summer meeting is the one that’s held in the small town of Årjäng. As is tradition, the $128,000 Årjängs Stora Sprinterlopp over 1.640 meters, was scheduled on the race card, but, this year, the track was drowned in rain, just before the main act of the day. The conditions went from very fast to something more slippery and many of the nine trotters had obvious problems in finding the perfect gait when the car left the field. But still, the pace was high when 8-year-old Love You mare Uza Josselyn was in front with driver Erik Adielsson. Uza Josselyn and Lionel defended their positions throughout the race when both Milliondollarrhyme and Day Or Night In looked for position outside the leader. Göran Antonsen and his Lionel did not want to see a horse in front of him and Lionel did the heavy job outside Uza Josselyn.

First choice Nadal Broline was served a perfect trip in second over, but Björn Goop’s trotter was, according to trainer and driver Goop, disadvantaged by the conditions and Nadal Broline could never challenge the leader seriously in the stretch.

Uza Josselyn sprinted to safe win in splendid mile rate 1:51.3, ahead of Nadal Broline and Lionel.

“I’m really happy for the trainer’s sake. The people around this horse have tried in Sweden a couple of times and missed the final of Elitloppet with just a nose last year and they’ve just kept working with their horse and this is very nice. Uza Josselyn was in perfect shape today and I had expectations after the warm up. She is definitely one of the best mares I’ve driven in my career”, said Adielsson.

Set for Stochampionatet

The $256,000 Stochampionatet for 4-year-old mares, bred in Sweden, will take place at Axevalla racetrack on Sunday, July 21 over the distance 1.6 miles and six eliminations were held on Friday night.

The dominant mare in the crop, Conrads Rödluva (S.J.’s Caviar) initiated the eliminations by winning easily from the lead and Daniel Redén’s mare will most probably be heavy favorite when the final takes place next week.

Others that won their eliminations were: Flaming Ace Sisu (Googoo Gaagaa), Fantasia Sisu (One Too Many), Lyx Håleryd (Scarlet Knight), Zeta Kronos (Donato Hanover) and Hankypanky Rubyred (Love You).

All the contenders in the race aim for double prize money since they skipped the ”premier race” as a 2-year-old, so the purse is actually $512,000. This is an opportunity that is given to all the horses in the biggest staked races for 2-, 3- and 4-year-olds in Sweden.

Stochampionatet 2019 — 1.6 miles

Horse – Trainer

Zeta Kronos (Donato Hanover) – Björn Goop
Lyx Håleryd (Scarlet Knight) – Joakim Elfving
Hankypanky Rubyred (Love You) – Timo Nurmos
Conrads Rödluva (S.J.’s Caviar) – Daniel Redén
Fantasia Sisu (One Too Many) – Robert Bergh
Miss Sober (Joke Face) – Robert Bergh
Real Caviar (S.J.’s Caviar) – Hans-Owe Sundberg
Head For Home (Conny Nobel) – Fredrik Wallin
Flaming Ace Sisu (Googoo Gaagaa) – Peter G Norman
Global Vintage (Love You) – Timo Nurmos
Racing Brodda (Prodigious) – Mattias Djuse
Activated (Jocose) – Fredrik Wallin

Tough fight in Paris

In 2017, Drole de Jet (Coktail Jet) won the $450,000 Grand Prix de l’U.E.T. for European bred 4-year-olds, but since then the 6-year-old has had difficult to hit the wire as a winner. In $90,000 Prix De Bruxelles at Enghien racetrack in Paris, the Pierre Vercruysse trained trotter battled hard with first choice Ble du Gers in the home stretch after a trip behind the leader.

Drole de Jet left his position and Vercruysse opted first over before the last turn approached and the fight between Ble du Gers and Drole de Jet was spectacular, where not any of the horses wanted to be defeated. Drole de Jet put his nose first at the wire and came home in mile rate 1:54.3 over 1.3 miles.