Bazire claims Prix d’Amerique with ‘magnificent’ Hooker Berry

Hooker Berry equipped French trotting maestro Jean-Michel Bazire together with his fifth Prix d’Amerique at Vincennes on Sunday.

Favorite Idao de Tillard’s quest to land the game’s most wanted prize ended prematurely when he was disqualified shortly after the beginning for breaking right into a gallop.

“Idao was idling a bit, and when Clement (Duvaldestin) gave him a kick he turned unbalanced,” defined the motive force’s trainer-father, Thierry Duvaldestin.

“That is racing,” he added.

Bazire, 51, suffered no such misfortune, having fun with a trouble-free passage to supply the six-year-old chestnut Hooker Berry with a superbly timed run on the skin.

Passing the main group up the quick straight Bazire performed to the packed stands – elevating his proper leg within the sulky in triumph nicely earlier than crossing the road on the 15-2 shot.

“Magnificent,” beamed Bazire, who gained his first Prix d’Amerique in 1999 with the mare Moni Maker.

“We had been getting crowded going downhill and I mentioned to myself ‘I’ve acquired to get us out of right here’ and once we got here out of the ultimate flip I knew we would gained it.

“He did it so nicely, excellent!”

Italian raider Ampia Mede SM got here in second with Italiano Vero third within the  discipline of 16 after two late defectors.

This was the 102nd version of a race based as a tribute to the American troopers who fought in World Struggle I.

The two,700m showpiece with a million euros in prize cash is harness racing’s undisputed world heavyweight championship, drawing a crowd of 40,000 with bets of over 40 million euros wagered.

First run in 1920 at Vincennes, the hippodrome on the east of Paris, the Prix d’Amerique is trotting’s equal to flat racing’s Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, staged throughout the French capital at Longchamp each autumn.

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