Drivers in the Plainridge Record

The Index

Each name opens a full driving record: every charted drive at this track, the horse behind which it was taken, the finishing position and the closing odds, together with any season in which the track itself published a leading-driver table that named them among the principals of its own colony.

The driving colony at a regional meeting is small and remarkably stable, so the same names recur across many seasons in a row. Reading a driver record here therefore means reading it against one single five-eighths-mile oval, rather than against the much wider spread of a national circuit where the opposition changes from week to week.

Where driver attribution begins and ends

132 of the 175 names in the driving record carry a page, on the same evidence test used elsewhere: two charted drives, or one win. 72 of them won at least one race at this track, and 47 appear exactly once, which is all that a single engagement on a single afternoon leaves behind.

Driver attribution is narrower than the rest of the archive. Charts that print a driver beside each horse survive for the 2001 to 2005 seasons, so a driving record stops in 2005 even where race day pages run on for another decade. The later documents record results without naming who drove.

The weight is unevenly spread. The busiest driver in the record, Greg D Bowden, took 225 charted drives for 28 wins, while the median driver appears behind just three different horses in total. That gap between the top of the list and its middle is the ordinary shape of a regional driving colony.

A driver is engaged race by race rather than employed by a stable, so the trainer names on a driving record show who called on that driver, not who paid a retainer. On a third of the cards in this record, a driver takes drives for more than one stable on the same afternoon.

132 entries listed of 175 names in the record, covering 3,574 charted starts. 72 have at least one win.

A2 drivers

3Adam J Wahl0 wins · 2004 2Andrei V Guidette0 wins · 2001–2003

B7 drivers

218Brad D Irvine35 wins · 2002–2005 46Bruce W Ranger9 wins · 2003–2004 20Bonnie J Rush3 wins · 2001–2005 11Brian G Nelson0 wins · 2001–2004 3Bruce S Espinosa0 wins · 2003–2005 2Bernard H Du Bois0 wins · 2002 2Brewer Adams0 wins · 2004–2005

C3 drivers

31Cornelius J Bonetti1 win · 2002–2005 4Craig N Fletcher2 wins · 2004 2Clifford J Bullock0 wins · 2003–2004

D13 drivers

74David J Marshall8 wins · 2003–2005 43Daniel T Sumner1 win · 2002–2004 32Donald V Guidette Jr0 wins · 2003–2004 26D J Whittemore4 wins · 2003–2005 18David L Ingraham1 win · 2002–2005 14Douglas L Gray0 wins · 2003–2004 6David N Cochrane1 win · 2003–2004 4Dawn P Anderson0 wins · 2001–2005 4Denis Normandin0 wins · 2004 4Donald G Billingsley Jr0 wins · 2003–2004 3Dennis J Durden0 wins · 2003–2004 2Daniel J Cappello0 wins · 2002 2Daniel R Tuccillo Jr0 wins · 2003

E4 drivers

39Elmer L Smith3 wins · 2001–2005 8Edward A Blash1 win · 2004 3Eugene D'Alessandro0 wins · 2003–2004 2Edward Gilman0 wins · 2004

F2 drivers

69Fernand A Paquet Jr14 wins · 2004 3Frank M Antonacci2 wins · 2003–2005

G4 drivers

225Greg D Bowden28 wins · 2001–2005 114Gregory J Annaloro18 wins · 2002–2004 57Graham Lewis4 wins · 2003–2004 4Gary D Mosher0 wins · 2003

H1 driver

7Heath R Campbell0 wins · 2004

I1 driver

24Ivan J Davies2 wins · 2001–2004

J27 drivers

221James E Hardy22 wins · 2001–2005 114John Hogan14 wins · 2001–2005 58James Marohn Jr10 wins · 2004–2005 47Jason J Bartlett7 wins · 2003–2005 34John S Nason5 wins · 2002–2004 25John A Di Stefano1 win · 2002–2005 23Joseph Alongi1 win · 2002–2005 22James W Smallwood3 wins · 2001–2005 21Joseph R Therrien0 wins · 2002–2004 17Jeffrey A Gulya1 win · 2003–2005 14John H Dunleavy Jr2 wins · 2004 14Joseph C Nassimos3 wins · 2004 11James C Smith1 win · 2003–2005 11Joseph Flynn1 win · 2004 8John L Mac Eachern1 win · 2003–2005 7John W Stark Jr1 win · 2004 6James C Davis2 wins · 2004 4Jason W Mac Dougall0 wins · 2002–2003 4Justin R Merton0 wins · 2002–2004 3John C Podres0 wins · 2004 2James P Mc Gowan0 wins · 2003–2004 2Jean P Hamel0 wins · 2004 2Jeffrey S Tallarino0 wins · 2005 2Jon L Anderson0 wins · 2005 2Joseph E Moeykens0 wins · 2004 2Joseph G Rankin0 wins · 2004 1John L Cannone1 win · 2004

K5 drivers

38Kevin P Switzer4 wins · 2001–2005 10Kim G Ireland0 wins · 2001–2004 6Ken C Murphy1 win · 2004 5Kevin Lare0 wins · 2002–2004 4K W Krikorian1 win · 2004

L4 drivers

41Leigh W Fitch6 wins · 2001–2004 35Lloyd A MacDonald6 wins · 2004–2005 15Loyal S Pratt2 wins · 2004 4Linda J Murray0 wins · 2004

M6 drivers

194Michael E Eaton17 wins · 2001–2005 78Michael L Cushing9 wins · 2003–2005 42Michael J Girouard2 wins · 2003–2004 5Marc J Bouthillier0 wins · 2004 3Michael D Rosenblatt0 wins · 2003–2004 1Mark E Whitcroft1 win · 2004

N2 drivers

3Nicholas R Coblentz0 wins · 2003 2Neville W Ryan0 wins · 2004

O1 driver

19Orrin Phipps3 wins · 2002–2005

P5 drivers

41Paul A Silva4 wins · 2003–2005 17Paul H Magan4 wins · 2002–2005 7Peter A Sarnie0 wins · 2003 5Patsy Spinelli Jr0 wins · 2003–2004 2Phillip J Fluet0 wins · 2004

R18 drivers

153Ralph H Andersen13 wins · 2001–2005 124Robert W Sumner14 wins · 2002–2005 94Ronald L Cushing16 wins · 2004–2005 41Robert Tisbert2 wins · 2002–2005 24Roland J Sears III0 wins · 2002–2005 21Russell F Lawson0 wins · 2001–2005 16Richard Pugliese2 wins · 2003–2004 10Ruel A Goodblood Jr0 wins · 2001–2002 9Randal R Smith0 wins · 2002–2005 9Richard A Flanders0 wins · 2003–2005 9Robert J Naginewicz1 win · 2004–2005 5Russell R Thomas Jr2 wins · 2003–2004 4Robert A Kenney0 wins · 2003–2004 4Robert S Lieberman0 wins · 2004 2Randy L Bickmore0 wins · 2001–2003 2Richard E Robertson Jr0 wins · 2003–2004 2Roger B Plante Jr0 wins · 2003 1Roderick L Cushing1 win · 2004

S9 drivers

66Shawn T Gray6 wins · 2002–2005 40Scott R Nichols3 wins · 2002–2005 26Shane J Taggart3 wins · 2002–2004 7Stephen M Smith1 win · 2003–2004 5Stephen F Quinn0 wins · 2001–2004 4Stephen M De Vincent0 wins · 2003–2004 3Shawn A Thayer0 wins · 2003 2Scott J Renz0 wins · 2004 2Stephen F Zajchowski Jr1 win · 2004

T9 drivers

64Todd M O'Dea8 wins · 2003–2005 55Todd M Kolbe4 wins · 2004–2005 11Thomas R Eaton3 wins · 2003–2005 8Thomas E Carlstrom0 wins · 2001–2005 5Thomas R Pye0 wins · 2004 3Todd D Smith1 win · 2003–2005 2Theresa L Donnelly0 wins · 2002–2004 2Thomas M Beckwith0 wins · 2003–2004 1Todd C Whitney1 win · 2003–2004

W8 drivers

206Winston D Campbell32 wins · 2001–2005 54Wallace R Watson3 wins · 2001–2004 29Wayne J Mastro2 wins · 2001–2004 5William L Varney1 win · 2003–2004 4William F Abdelnour0 wins · 2004 4William J Clark Jr1 win · 2004 2Wayne D Watson0 wins · 2001–2002 2William H Childs0 wins · 2004

Y1 driver

4Yannick Gingras1 win · 2004

What a driving record does not show

A strike rate calculated from these figures measures one track and nothing else. 72 drivers won here at all. The rest are not failures; they are drivers whose winning afternoons happened somewhere these documents do not reach, or else on one of the many cards that never came through at all.

Two drivers carry something extra: a leading-driver table the track published itself, naming its principals for a season. Those tables are reproduced wherever they survive, and they are the only place where the meeting itself ranked its own driving colony rather than leaving that order to be worked out afterwards from the charts.

Inside each letter the order is by charted drives, so the drivers who worked the meeting hardest sit at the top. Names appear exactly as the charts printed them, middle initial included, because that one initial is often the only thing separating two different drivers who happen to share a surname.

A row here gives charted drives, wins and the seasons driven, and those three figures should be read as a set. A driver with four drives and one win has a strike rate of twenty-five per cent on paper, which is a number that means very little until the sample behind it is checked.

Each drive listed on a driver page carries the horse, the finishing position, the closing odds and the trainer, and every one of those names opens onto a record of its own. Following one drive outward is the quickest way to see how a single afternoon's card actually fitted together.

Questions about the driver index