by Debbie Little

Dr. Richard Meirs’ Walnridge Farm hopes to be outpacing the competition at the Standardbred Horse Sale Company auction in Harrisburg, PA, with only four trotters in their 25-horse consignment.

“I work for a number of different clients, and at the present time, most of the client horses that I have are pacers,” Meirs said. “I’m very heavy on the pacing gait this year; it just is one of those years where my trotting-horse people didn’t have yearlings, but I’m going to have a much, much stronger group of trotters next year.”

Meirs thinks highly of his yearlings eligible to New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Ontario, and Pennsylvania.

“I have a lot of really good horses,” Meirs said. “I’m extremely excited about the first crop stallions that I’m going to be selling babies by. I have one real nice Captain Corey filly; I have three Perfect Sting colts and one Perfect Sting filly that I’m extremely excited about. They’re really growing up to be beautiful, and I’m very happy with them.”

The yearlings that Meirs are most excited about stretch across all three days of the sale.

Selling on Day 1 is one of Walnridge’s Perfect Sting sons, Hip #51 A Little Kick, a half-brother to Captain Crunch out of the Artiscape mare Sweet Paprika. Featured on Day 2 is the Captain Corey daughter Hip #391 Cherry’s Girl out of the Conway Hall mare Cherry Lovin, and two more Perfect Sting colts, Hip #192 He’s Gone Rogue out of the Rocknroll Hanover daughter Outtathisworld and Hip #506 Bring On The Sting out of In Deep Thought by Ponder. Day 3 is highlighted by the New Jersey and Kentucky eligible daughter of Perfect Sting, Hip #830 Enduring Love, out of the Somebeachsomewhere mare Enduring Hope.

“I have a big mixture of pedigrees,” Meirs said. “I have a Captaintreacherous filly [Hip #108 On Heir] that’s outstanding, I have a Greenshoe filly that I like a lot, and I have a very nice group of Always B Mikis.”

Selling on Day 1 is Hip #108 On Heir a daughter of Captaintreacherous out of the Bettors Delight mare Delightful Dragon, while Hip #388 Shelooksgoodngreen, a Greenshoe daughter out of Chapter Too by Chapter Seven, Hip #421 Dreamer’s Miki, a son of Always B Miki out of the Bettors Delight mare Dreamer’s Delight and Hip #424 East Side Darling, a daughter of Always B Miki out of the Somebeachsomewhere mare East Side Hanover, are all on Day 2.

Meirs also mentioned that he has a very, very nice Tactical Landing colt out of the RC Royalty mare Summers Windsong Hip #666 Phanto Summer Rain, as well as Hip #408 Callmebigpapi a nice son of Papi Rob Hanover out of Dancethenightaway by A Rocknroll Dance.

With Walnridge selling several New Jersey eligible yearlings at Harrisburg, Meirs is slightly concerned with the announced closing of Freehold Raceway.

“I don’t know how many people are going to really be excited to go out and look for Jersey-breds,” Meirs said. “I’ve had people come in and say, ‘I just want to see your PA-breds,’ and ‘I want to just see your New York-breds,’ but I don’t have anybody coming in saying, ‘I just want to see your Jersey-breds.’

“I think a lot of people are disappointed [about the situation with Freehold], and we have a lot of things to work out with that, like where we’re going to race and what we’re going to do with the race dates, and what we’re going to do with the appropriated money from the state of New Jersey that was earmarked for Freehold.”

Meirs also dislikes the fact that it’s a presidential election year, since Election Day coincides with Day 2 of Harrisburg, because he said politics can become a distraction from selling horses.

“I know for a fact that most of the conversation is going to be focused around the presidential election,” he said. “I’m certain of that. But nonetheless, you know, we’ll be fine…

“It’s going to be very raw and volatile out at Harrisburg, because it’s going to be an incredible mixture of personalities, and a lot of people that are going to be pretty emphatic about the situation in Washington. And so, we’ll see. I’m just going to try to encourage everybody to talk politics somewhere else and get my horses sold.”