Diva Delight Captures Top Miracle Mile Test

Diva Delight delivered a front-striding 1:55.1 victory in Thursday night’s $12,000 featured 10th event at Vernon Downs.

On a raw, rainy fall evening and over a good track, Diva Delight ($7.90) cut out fractions of :27.2, :57.4 and 1:26.2 en route to a one-length victory over Won Night Stand in the week’s top Miracle Mile test for female pacers.

The favorite, All Spirit, finished third.

Thursday’s bold-going tally was the third at the meet, the fifth this season and the 26th lifetime for the 5-year-old daughter of Bettor’s Delight-Mallbreaker, who increased her all-time bankroll to $241,296.

Ray Fisher, Jr. did the driving for trainer Jim Perry and owners William J. and Jack M. Heinz.

Driver Claude Huckabone, III teamed the first-place finishers in races four through six to secure his third triple of the 79-program local campaign, and increase his career win total to 1,988.

Fisher won the eighth event to record his initial double during the track’s 57th meeting.

Gary Gibson, 20-year-old son of Vernon’s late three-time dash-winning driving champion of the same name, earned his first pari-mutuel victory after he steered Geoffrey Zimmer’s pacer Pounne De Luxe to a 1:56.4 triumph in Thursday’s first race.

DOWNS DOINGS—Leading trainer Tracy Brainard hiked her win total to 61 after her pacer Bilmar Diva prevailed in Thursday’s 12th event…Friday’s 11-race program, which features the weekend’s top Miracle Mile trotting races, will begin at 6:55 p.m.