Posted Thursday, March 4, 2010
By Mike Paradise
Defending Maywood Park driver’s champion Josh Sutton is scheduled to be back at the half-miler for Thursday night’s program. It’ll be the 27-year-old Kentucky native’s first competition at the track since injuring his right wrist when he was tossed out of his bike a week ago (Thursday, February 25).
“The doctors told me my right wrist is severely sprained,” said Sutton prior to last night’s Balmoral card. “I’m glad it’s not broken but I’ve been in enough pain to keep from driving since it happened. I’m going to give it a go and drive at Balmoral on Wednesday night. We’ll see what happens. Hopefully I’ll be able to deal with the pain and continue on at Maywood for Thursday and Friday.
Sutton went down in a one-horse spill in last Thursday’s third race when he was driving the mare Mo Valley Maggie who fell in Maywood’s third race.
“I was sitting fourth over on the outside when my horse got hit in the face with a whip,” revealed Josh. “When that happened the mare stumbled badly and then she went down and catapulted me out of the bike.
“I was fortunate to land on my feet but I slipped when I was trying to stop and fell hard on by right wrist. I didn’t go to the hospital until the next morning even though I continued to be in pain. I drove two more races that night with the injury.”
In fact, three races later that night Josh guided Barus Oxford Lady to a victory for trainer Erin Elliott.
Sutton finished 2009 as Maywood’s leading driver and put up personal best numbers to season starts (2.046), wins (332) and money won ($1,862,735). Going into Wednesday night Josh has driven 46 winners in 225 tries for 2010.
Hopefully Smaller is Better: Maywood Park joins its sister track Balmoral Park Thursday night by reducing the minimum bet on is Trifecta wagers to 50- cents and on its Supefecta to 10 cents, which has proved to be a popular format on Balmoral’s Sunday cards. The Crete, IL track added the same reduced wager to its Wednesday and Saturdays races beginning with last night’s program.
Only time will tell if “Betting Little Creates Bigger Pools” with the circuit’s horseplayers and will prove to be a boon to the track’s mutuel handles. Both tracks have been plagued by smaller than normal fields, a combination of winter racing and management’s decision to cut the purses by another 25 per cent beginning with the opening of the 2010 season in late January, sending even more horses elsewhere.
My concern right now is that 6, 7 and even 8-horse fields at Maywood may provide for some smallish payouts on both Trifectas and Superfectas. For instance last Sunday’s card at Balmoral was short on horses and it included 50 cent Trifecta payoffs of $8.20, $14.90, $21.70, $5.15, and $26, and 10 cent ‘Supers’ of $11.99 and $14.79.
It’s hard to get excited about those numbers.
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