The Meadows Standarbred Owners Association would like to congratulate members Martin Valentic and John Bednarski, Jr on a recent landmark win by their pacer, Schoolkids.
A longtime Meadows regular, Schoolkids earned a victory in the 14th race on April 9 at Harrah’s Philadelphia. With the win, the 9-year-old pacer surpassed the $1 million mark in career earnings.
Schoolkids, a son of I Am A Fool-Game Bunny (Precious Bunny) is in his 8th season of racing. He started his career in 2008 in the Tracy Brainard Stable, winning 7 races and over $200,000. His top victory was in a division of the Matron Stakes eliminations at Dover Downs. At age three, he won 5 of 21 starts and banked just under $300,000, returning to Dover at the end of the season and winning the 3YO Matron Stakes with Tim Tetrick in the bike.
The remaining half of his career earnings have come in the aged ranks, where he has faced some of the sport’s best horses. In all, he now has 46 career wins in 169 starts. This season, he is 2-for-9 and still has plenty of speed. Last season at age 8, he paced in 1:49.4, just one-fifth of a second shy of his career mark of 1:49.3, set at Harrah’s in 2010.
His victory this week was in 1:53.2. Scott Zeron drove Schoolkids to the million-dollar-topping win for trainer Michael Capron. For Zeron, it was career win #2500.
