As we in Minnesota prepare for some sloppy winter weather this weekend and the northeast is getting buried under three FEET of snow, we keep making steady progress toward the warmth and sunshine of the 2013 Canterbury Racing Club season.

Clay Brinson is officially on board to train our charges this season.  As many of you know, Clay did an outstanding job both scouting talent and prepping the horses last season and we look forward to another season of working with him.

As the season starts to unwind at Hawthorne, Clay will be keeping his eye open so when we are ready that first part of April, he can pull the trigger quickly if there is something that we like.  The bottom level at Canterbury looks to be $4000, so we will look to claim a few levels up from there.  When you claim, you always want to try to make sure that there is somewhere to drop in case things don’t work out as planned once you get the horse back into the barn.

Should the group be considerably larger than last season, we also have Canterbury Park Hall of Fame Trainer Bernell Rhone ready to claim a horse or two from Tampa Bay Downs in Florida and train for us.  With nearly 1200 wins in a stellar career that includes four Minnesota Derby and four Minnesota Classic trophies, Bernell brings a lot of expertise to the claiming game and will give the stable a nice one-two punch!

We’ll be closing the group up the end of March, but the sooner we can get an idea of how big we’re going to be, the better idea we will have on how to proceed, so keep the forms coming in and we look forward to racing with you this season!