CHARLOTTETOWN, P.E.I. — For the Atlantic trot breed, Waiting On A Woman was a game changer.
After a decade of dominance across North America, he has rightly earned the title as Atlantic-bred trotter of the decade.
I ran a poll amongst horsepeople to identify the top choice in a number of categories and will be sharing those stories in the weeks to come during the winter break.
A product of the Tierney family in New Haven, the son of Northern Bailey and Southwind Faith was born on April 15, 2008, and immediately showed he was something special, starting off his career at the beginning of the decade in 2010. While it was Brian MacPhee that steered the Mitchell Tierney trainee to his first lifetime win, it was the combination of Tierney and rookie driver Corey MacPherson that will forever be associated with the horse. He won 10 races as a two-year-old and set a freshmen track record at Truro Raceway of 2:01.3. His 2:00.4 win in the Buddy Campbell memorial stake at Red Shores at the Charlottetown Driving Park (CDP) would be the fastest mile ever at the time by a two-year-old trotter in Atlantic Canadian history.
His three-year-old season would be littered with speed as he scored a 16-length romp in 1:59.1 at Red Shores at the Summerside Raceway to win a division of the Atlantic Sires Stakes for a new overall track trotting record. That still stands as the standard for three-year-old trotters at the Prince County oval.
The horse would make history by fending off arch-rival Maple Leaf Spirit by a length to become the fastest Atlantic-bred trotter ever on the East Coast with a 1:58.4 track record performance during a division of the 2011 P.E.I. Colt Stakes at the CDP. The mark stood until Gettin Messi and driver Mike McGuigan surpassed it in June 2019.
Waiting On A Woman came back at age four to win five straight open trots at the CDP then was sold to U.S. interests.
Now at age 12, the horse can look back at his career with record stats of 74 lifetime wins, $568,910 in earnings and a mark of 1:52.2 taken over Pocono Downs in Pennsylvania. The horse can boast racing the open class all across the Eastern Seaboard of the U.S., at Saratoga Raceway, Pompano Park, The Meadowlands, Pocono Downs, The Meadows, Vernon Downs, Plaineridge Racecourse.
Nicholas Oakes' column appears in The Guardian each Friday. He can be reached at [email protected].
