Four-time champion jockey Paddy Young, winner of two races at Saturday’s Radnor Hunt Races, opened a daylight lead over his fellow riders with two more wins at the High Hope Steeplechase on Sunday, including a score on Gil Johnston’s Fantastic Song in the featured $25,000 optional allowance hurdle. Young also won the Jay Trump maiden timber race aboard Boudinot Farms’ Harmony Bay for his wife, trainer Leslie Young.
Trained by Fenneka Bentley, Fantastic Song scored by three-quarters of a length over Bruce Smart’s Orchestra Leader in the High Hope feature. Augustin Stables’ Young Bohemian finished third, and Irv Naylor’s Nearby was fourth in a field on 10. Fantastic Song ran the optional allowance’s 2 1/8 miles in 4:04.60 on firm turf at Lexington’s Kentucky Horse Park.
The High Hope double gave Young his 10th victory of the year, double his closest challengers, Mark Beecher, Sean McDermott, and Bernie Dalton. Moving up in the standings was Jack Doyle, who has four wins from his three weekends of riding in the U.S.