Odds On Racing - Harness Racing

Odds On Racing's

Trainer of the Month
for October 2011

Sanders Russell

Sanders Russell

Walter Sanders Russell was born in Stevenson, Alabama in 1900. He began competiting in harness racing as a driver while still in high school and won his first race in 1915, behind Sammy R at the Winchester, TN fair.

The U.S. Trotting Association’s official records credit him with 1,116 first places, 531 seconds and 503 thirds. He won more than 20 major stakes with world records in 1946 and through 1955. His total winnings were over $2,000,000. In 1962, at age 62 and recovering from a broken leg, Sanders won the famed Hambletonian on A.C.’s Viking.

                                                            Sanders Russell & Chestertown

In November of 1962, Russell and a great bay colt named A. C.’s Viking came thundering down the stretch at Du Quoin, IL, to capture the coveted Hambletonian. There had been 15 trotting horses in this annual 3-year-old classic and the dash for home had looked like a cavalry charge, but in straight heats Mr. Russell and the Viking had exploded through what little daylight was available to whip the likes of Stanley Dancer and Del Miller and Johnny Simpson and Joe O’Brien.

A. C.’s Viking was to win $198,000 in 1962 (including the Yonkers Futurity and the Hambletonian, two of the three jewels in harness racing’s triple crown), more than any other 3 year old trotter in history.
                                    ACs Viking

A.C.'s Viking & Sanders Russell
His patience with young horses, his knack of drawing out the best qualities of a trainee Standardbred, was obvious from the start.

“Horses are like children, exactly,” Sanders says. “You must be patient with them and realize every minute that each of them will present you an entirely different ‘personality’, an entirely different problem. You must coax them, cajole them and yet be firm with them on certain pointers. A horse that grows up without manners will give you headaches ’til the end.”

There were other horses before A. C.’s Viking, horses that carried the Sanders Russell brown and tan colors off the fair circuits to the large pari mutuel tracks and the Grand Circuit and kept them there. Hal Tryax and Sir Laurel Guy were memorable ones, as were Tronita, Spring Hill, Dr. Billy, Pete Spencer, Junior Counsel, Try Wyn, Johnnie Brown, Queen Wilkes, Aimee Scot, Jewelry, Graydon and Kedrie.

Chestertown, was another that Russell was more than successful with... in August, 1947 the 4 year old bay colt won the Roosevelt two-mile trot in 4:192/5. Russell also steered Farand Hanover to win the 1959 Batavia Downs Colt & Filly Stake, his triumph in the Bloomsburg Fair Stake the same year with the same horse and a conquest in the 1961 Hanover Hempt Farm Stake with the then 2-year-old A. C.’s Viking.

Mr Russell passed away in 1982 at The Red Mile.