Mister Big blisters fifth qualifying win, ready for debut

The 2007 Older Pacer of the Year Mister Big romped to a 17 ¾-length, 1:50.4 victory in a qualifier Thursday at the Meadowlands, the fifth straight winning qualifying effort this year for the 5-year-old son of Grinfromeartoear trained by Virgil Morgan Jr.

With Brian Sears driving, Mister Big rushed from fourth past the opening quarter of :28 to take the lead shortly after the :57.1 half, drawing clear to the open-lengths victory, pacing his final quarter in :26 flat.

Mister Big, who enters 2008 with $1,692,189 in earnings for owner Joseph Muscara, won two qualifiers at Hoosier Park in early April before heading to the East Coast where he has now won three straight qualifying events at the Big M. His prior two victories were clocked in 1:51.2 and 1:52.2, respectively.

“Because of where he was going to have to go and how fast they were going to go, Mr. Muscara was super about just letting me take my time in getting him ready and having him right for the main events,” Morgan explained to harnessracing.com of the five qualifiers. “We just took our time and now I feel he’s ready to race with anybody. I didn’t want to go into a race needing for things to happen, or land on the front end and get his feelings hurt. We just didn’t want to race him until we knew he was more than ready.”

Morgan said he hopes to race Mister Big one start at the Meadowlands and then send the pacer to Harrah’s Chester for the Ben Franklins eliminations June 8.

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