CANADIAN HORSE RACING HALL OF FAME ANNOUNCES 2006 INDUCTEES

May 23, 2006 - Rexdale, ON - Celebrating its 30th anniversary, the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame announced its 2006 inductees, headlined by the late Steve Stavro in the Builders' category.

The class of 2006 features 11 new members, including four Standardbreds and two Thoroughbreds along with trainers James E. Day and David C. Cross Jr., and driver/trainers Doug Brown and Jacques Hebert.

The Standardbred horse inductees enjoyed outstanding careers on the racetrack as well as in the breeding shed and include Armbro Emerson, As Promised and Run The Table along with the brilliant race filly Armbro Feather. The exceptional Thoroughbred stallion Bold Ruckus and the filly Lauries Dancer, a multiple graded stakes winner in the U.S. and Canada's Horse of the Year in 1971, are the two Thoroughbred inductees.

All except Armbro Emerson and David C. Cross Jr., who were elected by the 12-member Veterans' Committee, were voted in by the two 16-member Election Committees. Successful inductees needed a minimum of 75 percent of the balloting.

Stavro, who passed away at age 78 in April, was at one time the majority owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs and Toronto Raptors and until 2000 owned the innovative Knob Hill Farms chain of food stores. He owned a relatively small but highly successful racing and breeding operation that produced numerous champions for Knob Hill Stable. In 1992 Stavro won two Sovereign Awards as Canada's leading owner and breeder. His horses earned six Sovereign Awards. Thornfield and Benburb each were voted Canada's Horse of the Year. Stavro got into racing in 1967. He served on the Board of Trustees of the Ontario Jockey Club, The Jockey Club of Canada and was an Honorary Director of Woodbine Entertainment Group.

Besides Dance Smartly, who won Canada's Triple Crown, Day saddled Queen's Plate winner Regal Intention, Eclipse Award winner Sky Classic and five Horse of the Year champions ' Dauphin Fabuleux, Imperial Choice, Ruling Angel, Peaks and Valleys and Dance Smartly. Day won more than 1,100 races and was Canada's leading trainer four times.

Cross, who was born in Vancouver and was a jockey before saddling his first winner in 1957, achieved national acclaim with Sunny's Halo. Canada's champion 2-year-old, the Canuck-bred colt won the 1983 Derby. He later won the $1 Million Super Derby in Louisiana. Classic Cat, a multiple stakes winner, earned more than $1 million for Cross. Other stakes winners included Dianes Halo, Quintana, Decent Davey, Big Destiny and Snow Game.

For many years Brown dominated the Canadian driving charts and was the OJC circuit's leading dash-winning driver from 1988 to 1997. The native of Bowmanville, Ont., earned 8,115 wins and over $86 million. He also conditioned 259 winners and drove the winners of five Breeders Crowns, including the great pacing mare Town Pro.

Hebert's career in harness racing embodied class, integrity, longevity and remarkable consistency. He was deemed by his peers as the 'consummate horseman.' Hebert, of Drummondville, Que., has 5,802 wins and trained 1,010 winners while based in Montreal. The top stakes horses he drove were Garland Lobell and Strike Out.

For ten years in a row Bold Ruckus was Canada's leading sire while standing at Park Stud in Caledon, Ont. He was owned and raced by Gerald E. Going of Alberta. Bold Ruckus sired 62 stakes winners, including champions Bold Ruritana, King Ruckus, King Corrie, all millionaires, plus Kiridashi, Beau Genius and Krz Ruckus. Carrying on his bloodlines is Bold Executive. He also sired the dams of 54 stakes winners.

One of Northern Dancer's great daughters, Lauries Dancer competed against the best fillies in North America in 1971, a year in which she won the Alabama Stakes, the Delaware Oaks, Canadian Oaks, Bison City and Star Shoot Stakes. She was owned by Mrs. Arthur (Helen) Stollery and bred by her husband's Angus Glen Farm of Unionville, Ont.

Armbro Feather was a multiple world champion pacer. A daughter of Most Happy Fella, she earned more than $1.4 million and during her career captured the Rose Are Red Stakes, Jugette, Breeders Crown and won an O'Brien Award as Canada's Older Pacing Mare in 1989. She produced 11 foals, none of which came close to their mother's glory.

The Alberta-based As Promised, a son of Abercrombie, was a multiple stakes champion with 71 victories. He sired winners of almost $14 million. His best offspring has been Breeders Crown champion Rons Girl. As Promised was owned by Keith Clark, who later sold him to Sky West Farms. For the past two years he has traveled to Australia as a dual hemisphere stallion.

Run The Table was a major stakes winner in all three years of his racing career but his notoriety was a formidable stallion in the 1990s at Jack and Don McNiven's Killean Acres of Ingersoll, Ont. One of his great wins on the track was his upset of Jate Lobell. His offspring earned more than $86 million and include Jays Table, Rabbi of Racing, Run To The Bank, Elegant Killean, Ryancoke, Heatherjeankillean and Cathedra, the dam of millionaires Cabrini Hanover and Cathedra Dot Com.

Armbro Emerson influenced his sport in every aspect: as an outstanding million-dollar winning racehorse; as a multi-million dollar producing sire and as an exceptional broodmare sire whose progeny are destined to have an enormous impact on the future of racing. One of his mares, Classic Wish, is the dam of Bettors Delight, who earned more than $2.6 million, and Triple Crown champion No Pan Intended. Armbro Emerson was owned by Ed Weisz of Willowdale, Ont., and The Light Heavyweight Stable.

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For further information contact Managing Director Louis Cauz at 416 675-3993, ext. 2399, Lou.Cauz@horseracinghalloffame.com, or Anna MacLeod at 905 858-3060, ext. 213. marketing@standardbredcanada.ca.