LOS ALAMITOS : Marylander Warrington Finds Greener Pastures in Southland

Among the newcomers at Los Alamitos this spring, Steve Warrington has enjoyed the most success.

The Maryland resident is second in the drivers’ standings, 14 victories behind Rose Croghan, and is 11th among trainers through Saturday. He indicated recently that he plans to split his stable this summer between Sacramento and his home base and will also participate in the fall harness meeting at Los Alamitos.

“I’m going to send some back East and some (to Sacramento),” he said. “I’ll probably spend a majority of my time up there. I’m pretty sure that’s how it will work out. I want to race here in the fall and I don’t want to ship them all back (to Maryland).”

Warrington, 40, is one of several horsemen recruited by Los Alamitos officials during the off-season. He has been at the top of the driver standings for most of the year, driving his own horses as well as picking up drives from other trainers, including No. 2 Robert Gordon. For most of the season, Warrington has driven Gordon’s Stand By, the top pacing filly at Los Alamitos with five victories in eight starts.

Warrington also drove Positive Spirit to a victory in the Invitational Pace in early February. Among the new drivers and trainers, he is the only one in the top five in either category. Terry Kerr is sixth in the driver standings and Greg Wright is eighth among trainers.

Warrington is nearing his 2,300th victory and thought California would be a good move.

“I’ve had pretty good luck,” he said. “I expected to compete out here. I didn’t think I’d get lost.”

Warrington plans to return to Maryland in early May and check on the progress of his 2-year-olds, which are being pointed to the Maryland Sires Stakes under the direction of his two brothers.

“I’m going for 10 days after this meet is over,” he said. “I’ll train all of the 2-year-olds twice to see what I’ve got.”

Eight of the 21 horses eligible for the $250,000 Shelly Goudreau Memorial Pace on April 25 raced Saturday. Among them was True Tyrant, who had won the first 13 races of his career but suffered his first defeat Saturday.

True Tyrant finished second to Ramsey Hanover, beaten by three quarters of a length in the preferred class, one level below the invitational. True Tyrant set impressive fractions for the first three quarters of the mile, but yielded late in the stretch. The time for the mile was an impressive 1:54 2/5.

True Tyrant won all 12 of his 1991 races on the Edmonton-Calgary circuit and won his first Los Alamitos start against older horses on March 14 in 1:55 3/5. Of the Goudreau hopefuls, True Tyrant is considered by many horsemen as the horse to beat. Even in defeat, he was impressive, especially to driver Terry Kerr.

“He went every quarter in 28 (seconds) after he missed a week,” Kerr said. “I can’t fault him. A horse that dropped out of the invitational beat him.”

Skytel, the best hope of Doug Ackerman’s stable, won Saturday’s 12th race in 1:54 4/5, his best time. Owned by Richard Staley of Los Angeles, Skytel beat older horses for the second consecutive week as well as Goudreau nominees Shiney Key, who was racing for the first time since September, and Bright As Day, who went off stride and finished last.

“He was ready to go,” said Ackerman’s son, D.R., who drove the 3-year-old Nihilator colt. “We’ll take next week off and get ready (for the series). True Tyrant is most definitely the horse to beat. He’s above everybody else--right now.”

The Goudreau series will have two legs, April 11 and 18, leading to a $250,000 final on April 25, the closing night of the meeting.

Heavy Tipper has moved to the top of the pacing division with his second consecutive victory in the invitational on Saturday. It was his third invitational victory in March and his fourth of the meeting, one more than Positron, who still holds the fastest mile of the meeting--1:53 on Feb. 1.

In Saturday’s race, Heavy Tipper, a 4-year-old gelding by Denali, also set the first track record of the winter-spring meeting with a 1:53 2/5 mile, edging Positron by three quarters of a length, and setting a new mark for 4-year-old geldings. The time was a fifth of a second faster than Noble Hero’s record set in last year’s Fireball Series final.

Heavy Tipper, owned by James Coats of Citrus Heights, led wire to wire.

“He doesn’t tire easily,” driver Rick Kuebler said. “He’s a big strong horse. His only weakness is he doesn’t take the turns as quickly as he does the straights.”

Heavy Tipper will probably go to Chicago this summer when trainer Paul Blumenfeld splits his stable between Chicago and Sacramento. His connections are eager to try the gelding on a track with a longer stretch than Los Alamitos’, which is slightly longer than one-eighth of a mile.

Last year, Todd Ratchford was the seventh-leading driver at Los Alamitos. Among his 67 victories were several stakes-winning drives with Heavy Tipper in 3-year-old pacing stakes. Ratchford also trained a string of his own horses.

This year has been much different. Ratchford is 19th in the drivers’ standings through Saturday, with five victories in 164 races. His stable consists mostly of low-level claiming horses. At the end of April, when most of the California harness community shifts to Sacramento for the summer, Ratchford will move his stable to Michigan, where he raced successfully last winter, winning 56 races in four months at Muskegon and Sports Creek.

“It’s not tough driving here, it’s the horses that seem to be better,” Ratchford said. “It’s hard to compete when you’ve had your $6,000 claimer for three or four years and the other horses are coming down to him from the $8,000 and $10,000 level.”

Last winter, Ratchford, 27, sold several of the horses he took to Michigan and this year hopes to sell his entire stable. He plans to return to California and buy a smaller stable of higher quality stock.

“I’ll come back with nothing and claim or buy some New Zealand-bred horses or whatever’s around,” he said.

Despite his record, Ratchford can consider himself lucky. Last Thursday, he escaped injury when his bike broke shortly before the start of the seventh race, splitting apart at the wheels and pitching him onto the muddy track.

Less than an hour later, his uncle, Don, who also trains at Los Alamitos, lost a 4-year-old filly, Mother Goose, who collapsed and died in front of the paddock shortly after the ninth race. The filly had finished fifth in the one-mile race.

“It was not a good night for the Ratchfords,” Todd Ratchford said.

Los Alamitos Notes

The California Breeders Stakes for 3-year-olds were featured each night last week: The trotting gelding Bonefide Boy, trotting filly Stock Holding, pacing filly Sex Kitten and pacing colt Picture Perfect-A won respective divisions. . . . The Cypress Series for colts and geldings and Stanton Series for fillies will begin tonight. Both are pacing series and will have $30,000 finals.