WILKES-BARRE PA – The Bar Hopping sophomore trotting ridgling Top Me Off became the only male to come through the Bobby Weiss Series preliminaries undefeated, as he equaled his mark of 1:54.2 with a hard-earned victory in his division of that group’s $17,500 third and final prelims during the Sunday twilight card at The Downs at Mohegan Sun Pocono.
Todd Schadel guided Top Me Off, last year’s PA Fair champion and undefeated in four starts this year, to the lead before the :27.3 first fraction, with Tart Tongue yielding then stalking him through middle fractions of :57 and 1:25. Tart Tongue took his shot in the Pocono Pike but came up a half-length short, with Black Tie Bash closing well to get nosed out of second behind the winner, who is also trained by Todd and is co-owned by him, his wife Christine, and Rick and Regina Beinhauer.