Dawkins moving up at Assiniboia Downs

WINNIPEG, Manitoba (CMC):

Former Jamaica champion jockey Dane Dawkins continued his steady rise up the charts on Monday at the Assiniboia Downs racetrack in Canada - but current leader Prayven Badrie of Trinidad & Tobago and defending champion Antonio Whitehall of Barbados grabbed the headlines with wins in the two feature races.

Dawkins, the 2022 Jamaica champion jockey, logged a pair of wins on the seven-race card to carry his aggregate into double figures, on 10, for the season - which opened on May 20 and closes on September 24 - and moved him into seventh place in the jockeys' standings.

Badrie, whose 24 wins make him the current leading jockey, won the $51,000 co-feature Jack Hardy Stakes aboard Midnight Lady, and Whitehall, second in the jockeys' table, stayed within three of him when he won the $50,500 Derby Trial Stakes.

Dawkins got into the frame when he recovered remarkably and drove the 3-1 chance Dawn of the Devil to a half-length win in the $20,000 maiden special weight second race for maidens, fillies and mares three years old and upwards, running six furlongs on the dirt.

Dawn of the Devil pressed the front runners from on the inside and tried to squeeze through on the turn, but Dawkins had to pull up the four-year-old, dark bay filly at the halfway mark and she dropped back into fourth.

A determined Dawkins reproduced Dawn of the Devil on the outside going around the final turn and she took over late to clock one minute, 14.90 seconds.

Dawkins did not have to wait long for his second win, and he followed up when he steered 9-4 choice Frisco Kid to a 1-1/4 lengths victory in the $16,500 allowance optional claiming third race over one mile on the dirt, featuring three-year-olds and upwards that have never won a race other than a maiden, claiming, starter or restricted, or never won three races.

Frisco Kid forced the pace from three wide and duelled two wide between horses into the final turn before Dawkins got the five-year-old bay gelding to shake off a rival midway into the final straight, open a short but clear lead, and get to the line in 1: 42.26.

Badrie guided the 6-1 bet Midnight Lady to a half-length win in the Jack Hardy - the sixth race on the card - for three-year-old fillies over 1500 metres.