Crazed wins in 1:52.4, headed for Hambletonian

Crazed added his name to the list of colts who will be dropped into the entry box for the Hambletonian elims next week after crushing a field of 3 year olds at the Meadowlands Thursday night  by 9 1/2 lengths in a career-best 1:52.4. Tim Tetrick was in the bike as the son of Credit Winner scored his third victory in four starts this year.

Trained by Frank M. Antonacci for the Lindy Racing Team, Gary and Ellen Hoffman and Robert Rudolph, Crazed has been brought along gradually.

“The kind of the attitude we took with this horse was that every week take small baby steps forward and if we happen to get him there for the Hambo and he tells us that that’s where he belongs, then we’ll put him there,” Antonacci told harnessracing.com.

Crazed qualified at the Meadowlands on June 5, finishing second in 1:59.1. He won his first start at the Big M (where he has raced all summer) in 1:57.3. After a third-place finish in 1:56.3 he has won in 1:55.1 and now 1:52.4.

“It usually doesn’t work out that way, to have that solid progression that you could bring a horse around like that, but it’s kind of worked out for him,” Antonacci said.

Crazed was eligible to some earlier stakes, including the Yonkers Trot, but because of a late start and finish to his freshman season last year, he wasn’t rushed into this year’s schedule.

“He was kind of growthy and had some soreness issues in mid summer around June, July,” Antonacci said of Crazed’s freshman year. “I was probably pretty close to qualifying him in July, then I backed right off and actually gave him a full month off in the middle of the summer. Then I got him ready there in Lexington. And for a horse that really didn’t have too much training in him and obviously not too many starts he really didn’t have a bad showing in either the Matron or Breeders Crown. He had outside posts and really didn’t have a shot.

After winning a qualifier at Lexington in 1:57 he won a conditioned race at Vernon Downs in 1:58.1 then finished fifth in a Matron Stakes elimination at Dover Downs. He qualified for the Breeders Crown final with a fourth-place finish behind Deweycheatumnhowe in an elimination and was seventh in the final, his last race of ’07.

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