LOS ALAMITOS : Canadian Drivers Warm Up Here

Todd Beelby and Bruce Clarke, driving in their first Los Alamitos meeting, sleep peacefully each night, only occasionally dreaming of the snow and biting winds they left in Western Canada.

Beelby and Clarke have been among the top 10 drivers for several years at Stampede Park in Calgary and Northland Park in Edmonton.

Beelby, 30, brought down a stable headed by Armbro Larson, a leading force in the weekly feature pace. “My brother, Clark, bought him as a yearling for $25,000,” Beelby said of the 5-year-old gelding.

“Clark had three in the invitational one night and turned this one over to me. He’s just a real honest horse. He doesn’t wear boots or bandages, and how many invitational horses do you see like that?”

Beelby, whose father Jack drove here during the 1970s, said the weather lured him south. “I’ve got a bunch of old injuries; I dislocated my hip a couple of years ago,” he said. “Some days when it’s cold, I can feel it, but I haven’t felt it here.”

While Beelby plans to return home after the meet ends on March 25, Clarke hopes to go to Sacramento for a session through July 22.

Clarke, 37, has made an immediate impact with 21 winners, placing him fifth in the driver standings. He is here with his father, Roy, a trainer.

“I love it down here,” Clarke said. “The weather is great, the racing is good, and the people are so friendly. Everything is much more professional than back home--the judges, the management, the drivers. Back home, they’re uptight and always fighting.”

*

Trainer-driver Doug Ackerman, honored by the track Saturday night for his induction into the Harness Living Hall of Fame, credits much of his success to winter training at Del Mar for the last 41 years.

“It’s a wonderful climate and the best surface in the world,” said Ackerman, who owns a home in nearby Solana Beach. He stays there from late October to late April, then moves his stock to Hazel Park in Detroit the remainder of the year.

Ackerman, a 67-year-old Indiana native, and son D.R. are alone at the coastal track for the first time this winter with 37 standardbreds. “At one time, there were about a thousand head at Del Mar in the winter,” Ackerman said. “There aren’t many horses in California now.”

Ackerman and primary owner Richard Staley of La Jolla pay an estimated $30,000 to the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club and 22nd Agricultural District for use and maintenance of the track.

Ackerman has big plans for R.S. Victory, who was purchased for $170,000, the highest price paid for a trotting colt at the Harrisburg (Pa.) sale. Ackerman hopes he will join Noble Hustle (1979) and Self Confident (1981) as 2-year-old trotting champions he has trained. He should be ready in May.

The stable also includes Stonewall Cosmos, a leading 3-year-old colt trotter, and Hattie, a 3-year-old filly pacer who finished second last year in the Breeders Crown. Hattie is a Staley homebred by Abercrombie out of Albaquel, a mare pacer that remains one of Ackerman’s favorites.

*

Gene Vallandingham reached the 2,500-victory milestone last week, driving David’s Marenga to a 15-length victory in a $15,000 Sire Stake trot for 3-year-old fillies.

Vallandingham, 54, was born on Walnut Hall Farm in Kentucky.

Veteran Jim Grundy, 61, began the week with 2,498 victories and should be next to join the club. Rick Kuebler, 41, is in close pursuit with 2,460.