28 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise Four words pretty much hit the nail on the head as far as driver Brandon Bates decision to apply his trade at the start of this year’s meeting at Hawthorne: “So far, more

23 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise Castle Flight, nicely handled by Kyle Wilfong, showed last night he’s going to be a force this season in the Hawthorne Open Pace. The Derek Burklund trained gelding didn’t just beat a more

22 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise The most difficult time for handicapping a horse race on the Chicago circuit comes at the start of a meeting, especially in the winter time. Many horses are competing after a layoff, more

21 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise When Balmoral Park and Maywood Park went belly-up and left Hawthorne as the state’s only facility remaining to host harness racing, it caused many Illinois horsemen scrambling for other sources of income. more

16 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise The gals take over the Hawthorne spotlight on the first Sunday card of this year’s long lengthy meeting. The featured Open Pace for fillies and mares drew a seven-horse field with a more

15 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise The wait is over. Hawthorne opens its doors tonight to a new decade of Illinois harness racing. It’s an extended meeting that will encompass 32 consecutive weekends of racing and will take more

14 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise Hawthorne Racecourse opens its 2020 harness racing meeting tomorrow (Saturday) evening in what promises to be a most about face decade in many years for the Illinois Standardbred industry. All the optimism more

9 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise As we await Wednesday’s double draw for the upcoming opening weekend of the 2020 Hawthorne harness racing meeting, Hawthorne has been a beehive of activity since it opened its backstretch to horsemen more

8 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise With just one week remaining until the opening of the Hawthorne’s 2020 Illinois harness racing meeting it seemed like a good time to check in with Springfield based trotting guru Mike Brink. more

7 Feb 2020

By Mike Paradise The old idiom “Who Would Have Thought” had to be running though the minds of those who remember the 2019 Illinois Harness Horse of the Year Louzotic when the filly trotter was more

28 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise It’s been a long time, make that too long of a time, since Illinois horsemen and their owners will go into a harness racing season with the kind of optimism created by more

27 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise The Illinois horsemen’s response to race their ICF pacers or trotters in Saturday’s Fall Reviews in Springfield turned out to be prodigious, and that’s not an overstatement, far surpassing last year’s numbers. more

23 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise Sunday was closing night for the 2019 Hawthorne harness racing season and there were two Night of Champion Consolation stake races to be decided as well an Open II trot. It would more

22 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise Not even a rain storm could put a damper on Hawthorne’s Night of Champions that saw drivers Casey Leonard and Kyle Husted bring home three winners each on the 12-race program and more

21 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise All the hard work brought about in their labor of love. All the joys and the tears in those many topsy-turvy times developing their young horses. For Illinois horsemen and their employees more

20 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise It was a year ago that veteran Illinois based trainer Steve Searle had his “dream come true” evening, when three of his trotters proved best on Hawthorne’s Night of Champions. The long-time more

19 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise Last weekend’s final legs of Hawthorne’s Night of Champions series turned out to be a major boon for a number of ICF horses. Instead of racing in consolation events this weekend, they’re more

15 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise Trainer Don Filomeno’s late-blooming He’zzz A Wise Sky did what he had to do last night to get a shot at the winner’s share of an estimated $125,000 pot in the Incredible more

14 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise If you want to go to the “Big Dance” you need an invite. In this case the “Big Dance” is next Saturday’s Hawthorne’s Night of Champions and an invite for a horse more

13 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise There are a number of significant final legs of Night of Champions series on Friday night’s Hawthorne racing card and in some events a check earning finish could be the difference for more

12 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise Months ago when Hawthorne announced its 2019 harness racing stakes schedule, many of us expected that when the Night of Champions came about in mid-September the Plesac stake would be a confrontation more

8 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise It’s unusual to have three different horses on the same card with extended winning streaks of five or more races nevertheless that’s the circumstances Sunday night at Hawthorne. Horses winning streaks can more

7 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise A couple of filly and mare pacing events Friday night have implications on the upcoming Night of Champions Tony Maurello stake for ICF pacing mares, ages four and up.. Both Saturday’s ninth more

6 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise With rather comfortable back-to-back Open Pace victories on his list of recent successes Hawthorne’s kingpin Fox Valley Gemini is getting a well-deserved week off to prepare for next weekend’s Night of Champions more

5 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise With the Governor’s Cup behind us and the third and last leg of the Night of Champion Incredible Finale series another week away, this is a quiet weekend for the majority of more

1 Sep 2019

By Mike Paradise The Chupp Racing Stable’s Pine Dream looks to make it three consecutive wins in Hawthorne’s Open Trot Sunday night for driver Casey Leonard and with his horse’s chief rival not in the more

31 Aug 2019

By Mike Paradise It was a harness racing program to remember when 25 races were contested Friday, the most on a single day in the long history of Hawthorne Race Course. The king-size double header more

30 Aug 2019

By Mike Paradise Quantity and quality is the ideal combination to have going into Friday night’s “Hawthorne Marathon” and Springfield based trainer Mike Brink has just that with 13 horses competing and eight of them more

29 Aug 2019

By Mike Paradise It’s the time of the year when many of the two-year-old ICF pacers and trotters competing Friday night in the Illinois Department of Agriculture sponsored stakes races at Hawthorne are at, or more

24 Aug 2019

By Mike Paradise The old proverb “If at first you don’t succeed try, try again” can be traced back 180 years and it certainly wasn’t intended for a horse racing meeting however it does fit more