He has funny little markings on his face–a snip, an asymmetrical blaze. But don’t let those off-center splashes of white fool you–there is nothing humorous about this bay when he is racing up the stretch.

Randleston Farm’s Top Of The Bill snatched the third leg of Steeplechasing’s Triple Crown series with a win in the $75,000 National Hunt Cup Grade II Novice Hurdle Stakes at Radnor Hunt Races in Malvern, Pa., May 20.

Trained by Jimmy Day, of Millwood, Va., the horse schooled all winter for this series, which started with The Carolina Cup (S.C.) on April 1. The 5-year-old son of Lear Fan might have been steeplechasing’s first Triple Crown winner, had he not run into some interference in the Temple Gwathmey at the Middleburg Spring Races (Va.), the second leg of the series. Top Of The Bill placed second there to Kinross Farm’s South Of Fifty but was disqualified after the race, and jockey Carl Rafter was fined for careless riding.

Day does not want to think about the “what ifs.”

“It’s done,” Day said. “We set out what we came to do, and he took two of the three. He’s a very good horse who loves racing.”

Top Of the Bill had a little more pressure for this leg. Sara Lyn Stable’s Brazilian-bred Quem Se Atreve (Paddy Young) arrived in the paddock with $60,000 in winnings for the season. The front-running horse did as expected, taking the rest of the seven-horse field for a wild romp on firm going, but he faded about an eighth of a mile from the wire, letting Top Of The Bill take over.

At this point Barracuda Stable’s The Next Man (Robert Massey) closed in on Top Of The Bill, but it was too little too late. Top Of The Bill just pinned his ears back and dug in, leaving The Next Man 11�2 lengths back.

“I love the hill here,” Day said of Radnor’s long, gradual hill to the wire. “I like it for my horse because he’s so tough. The Next Man has been there every time. You can’t ever count him out. He took a bad fall at Middleburg and I was kind of surprised to see him, but he looked very good here.”

Rafter’s good luck did not stop at Radnor. He picked up two more wins at Potomac Hunt Races (Md.) on Sunday in the open timber on Leslie McNemar’s Java To Go and in the novice timber on Willard Freeman’s Father Paul.

Salmo Has His Say
The field for the $40,000 Radnor Hunt Cup had several timber specialists and a few who have been just shy of the winner’s circle this year. As expected, Irvin S. Naylor’s Salmo (Robert Walsh) took the lead, leaving the rest of the seven-horse field to follow gamely.

Salmo relinquished his lead to Make Your Own (Cyril Murphy), Mr. Fater (Young) and Chinese Whisper (Chris Read) several times, then just as easily took it back.

Tragedy struck about 2 miles into the 31�2-mile timber race, when Sham Aciss chipped in and flipped, breaking his neck as he landed. He died instantly, and his jockey James Slater broke his clavicle in the fall.

At the last fence, Ghost Valley (Jody Petty) came up on the inside of Salmo and gave a valiant effort, jumping ahead of him and galloping off toward the wire, but Walsh knew he had plenty of horse and tore after the big gray to catch him easily. The two horses battled up the hill with Salmo winning by more than a length.

This is the 10-year-old’s (by Northern Baby) second win for the spring season. Salmo took the open timber with Chip Miller at Winterthur (Pa.) on May 7. After Salmo dumped his usual jockey Roger Horgan at the Grand National (Md.), trainer Jack Fisher had a few words for Salmo’s next jockeys.

“The main thing is to leave him alone,” Walsh said. “[Fisher] told me, even if you are not out in front, not to touch his mouth. Just don’t touch him at all. I think after the first few fences he got his confidence together. Even when they came to him, he was fine with that. When Jody came to him in the stretch and would get a little closer, he would pick it up a little more. I never touched him at all. He really jumped well.”

Salmo is done for the season. The chestnut’s win puts Naylor, who has had 10 horses running with seven different trainers this spring, way up in the National Steeplechase Association timber standings with $149,900 in winnings. His best timber runners have been Allimac, Askim, Salmo and Turkish Corner. The latter, however, bowed a tendon at Iroquois (Tenn.) and is out for the year.

Attitude Adjustment
Matt McCarron teamed up with trainer Doug Fout and EMO Stable’s Orison for a bold win in the $25,000 allowance hurdle. McCarron was virtually covered up for most of the race, allowing Willowdale winner Wicklow Bound (William “Billy” Santoro) and Westbound Road (Massey) to take the lead.

As they rounded the bend into the stretch for the last time, Orison emerged from the pack and took the last with Best Attack (Miller) hot on his heels. Orison staved off his challenger by 3/4 length, giving the 4-year-old his second win for the month.

McCarron used a little sneakiness to get his win. “Yeah, we came from way back, a little further than I would have liked. I had to move up pretty quickly in the end,” he said. “I heard Rob chatting to Billy, and every time Rob would chat to Billy, Billy would kind of turn his head around so I kind of took advantage of that and slipped by him.”
But as pretty as his win was and as mild mannered as Orison appeared in the winner’s circle, Fout said this horse had only one friend last year.

“We bought him late last fall, and he was a mean, common son-of-a-gun,” Fout said. “He would pin you in the stall and really get you with both barrels so we took him to Camden and started working with him. Right off the bat I liked the horse. Everybody else hated him.”

Fout, who seems to have a knack with problem horses, said there was no real trick to making him easy to work around again.

“I school all my horses in groups of five. I always put him last or second-to-last, and it took about four or five months staying in the back of the group until he settled,” Fout said. “I never let a horse go galloping by himself. I always put them in line and force them to pay attention. He has gotten so he enjoys it now. You have to be a good jumper to go to Radnor, and he is.”

Petty won two races for Augustin Stables and trainer Sanna N. Hendriks. The first came with Dynamite Flyer in the $25,000 maiden hurdle. Petty was riding one of three sons of Dynaformer in the nine-horse field.

Hudson River Farm’s Sovereign Duty (Danielle Hodsdon) challenged the 5-year-old heavily from the last fence to the wire, where the horses appeared to bump several times in the stretch. After a steward’s inquiry into the race Dynamite Flyer was named the winner by a head.

“We ran him on the flat, and he actually won three in a row for us,” said Hendriks, who has known the horse since he was a yearling. “Then last year he developed a wind problem and so we did some surgery on him, and it looks like it worked. If his wind stays OK he should be a pretty good horse.”

Petty’s second win for the day came with South Monarch in the $20,000 maiden claiming race.