Photo by Lisa Photo - Lambeth Media

DREAMING IN TECHNICOLOUR
Conceding six lengths at the start to
some of the world’s best trotters usually
gets you ulcers, not a trip to the winner’s
circle.
Watching from the Meadowlands
paddock, O’Reilly gulped hard when he
saw Slave Dream decelerate at the start as
Campbell struggled to prevent a bobble
behind the gate from turning into a break.
Or, to put it in his own words: “I puked in
my mouth.”
“I wanted to cry,” said Cianci, at trackside
with Russo and a large delegation of
friends and family.
“At that point, I just hoped we’d get
some money,” O’Reilly said. “ You really
can’t give horses of that calibre six or
September 2010 • The Harness Edge
seven lengths and expect to win.”
But win they did. Campbell hustled
Slave Dream back into contention along
the inside, saved ground all the way, accelerated
into a narrow opening when Tacs
Delight moved over in the stretch and
snuck up the rail to outkick Enough Talk
by a neck in a career-best time of 1:52.
“To see his number fly by at the end
was just incredible,” said Cianci. He and
Russo had brought about a dozen guests
and family members to the race, among
them Cianci’s five-year-old son Franco Jr.,
who’d been adamant about going in case
the horse got his picture taken.
“My kids love to see him race. They
got a taste for it in Montreal before it
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POCONO DOWNS, IN THE PADDOCK
closed,” said Cianci, a father of four.
“That was probably a mile in 1:50
and change, considering where he
started,” O’Reilly said. “John said after
‘you told me he could win, but I didn’t
think he could win from there’.”
Beaulieu, 48, who watched in a
teletheatre at Tioga Downs, was cheering
him on. "I'm happy for the horse. When
you win in the U.S., it's always bigger than
if you win in Canada to people in the
horse business. And it makes me feel I did
my job. If he's the way he is now, maybe
it's because of the way we broke him and
protected him and took care of him along
the way." It also helped him decide training
is what he still wants to do for a living,
reversing an earlier decision to give up the
sport at the end of this year.
Three weeks later Slave Dream was
back at Rideau Carleton for the 2010 edition
of the Frank Ryan which he won by
more than three lengths in 1:53.3.
The win was the 20th of Slave
Dream’s career and pushed his career
earnings beyond $704,000. He’s now the
fastest Quebec-bred trotter, though he’s
got a way to go yet on the earnings side to
surpass Hanko Angus (winner of the 1998
Maple Leaf Trot) and McCooeye, both
millionaires.
He could still up a lot of ground this
season with a tentative schedule that
includes the Credit Winner stakes at Vernon
Downs, the Breeders Crown at
Pocono Downs and Allerage Stakes at The
Red Mile.
For O’Reilly, it’s already been the
adventure of a lifetime.
“To win a race like that on Hambletonian
Day, in front of 25,000 people,
against the best trotters around, that’s just
as it good as it gets,” he said. “I’ve been
dreaming in Technicolor since I started,
when all you have is a dream. I was always
going to win the big one. The Hambo. The
Nat Ray.”
After the race, O’Reilly loaded up the
gelding and headed off to the farm of his
friends, the Crevanis, where Slave Dream
got to relax in a field while he got dinner
and a hero’s welcome.
“And you know what. They’d have
treated us the same if we finished last.
That’s the beauty of it.”