Cancelliere team dominate Philly qualifiers

CHESTER PA – Once again the “Cancelliere Breakfast Special” was on the menu of the Tuesday morning qualifiers at Harrah’s Philadelphia, with Maximus Miki (Always B Miki) and then Ruthless Hanover (Somebeachsomewhere) easily winning the first two of the harness racing qualifiers for the team of trainer Tom Cancelliere and owner John Cancelliere.

Ruthless Hanover was again the main entrée, as the eight-year-old roared through fractions of :28, :55.2, and 1:23 en route to a 6¾ length victory in 1:51 with the guidance of George Napolitano Jr. The Somebeachsomewhere gelding went the fastest mile ever on a 5/8-mile track when he won here in the 2023 Joseph Auger Memorial, stopping the clock in 1:46.3. Last year he defending his Auger title successfully, in 1:47.2. But the Auger was his fifth start of 2023 and second of 2024, and with his 2025 card showing nothing but this qualifier and a Q win on April 29 in 1:53.1, it will be interesting if “Ruthless” tries for a three-peat on “Super Sunday” just twelve days hence.

Maximus Miki, an altered son of Always B Miki and a multiple Open-level winner, is quite the “opening course” himself, and he followed up on his 1:55.3 qualifier of April 29 with a success involving fractions of :28.1, :56.1, and 1:24.4 en route to an 18 length triumph in 1:52.2, also with Napolitano driving.

There was good trotting action as well during the qualifying session. The $1.2+M-winning French Wine (in his career a winner in the Pennsylvania and Kentucky programs, second in the Futurity and the Hambletonian Maturity, and 2-3 in the Breeders Crown) rallied in 1:55 in his five-year-old bow, the son of Bar Hopping a half-length ahead of Super Duper Cooper (second to Sir Pinocchio in the NYSS final last year), for Team Orange Crush.

Also looking good was the sophomore Gimpanzee filly Voguish, a nose off What A Bid Hanover in the Goldsmith Maid in her previous start, winning in 1:54.3, with Todd McCarthy doing the driving for trainer Andrew Harris and connections.

Replays of the Philly qualifiers are available at www.phha.org.

For complete race results, click here: US Trotting results.

From the PHHA/Harrah’s Philadelphia