Voting by the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame Thoroughbred and Standardbred Election Committees has been tallied and the CHRHF Class of 2024 is now confirmed.
Previously, the Board of the CHRHF agreed the Class of 2024 would be comprised of six inductees per breed and was also provided the option for a Nomination Committee to use only five categories, with two inductees selected in one category, in order to meet a total of six inductees per breed. The 20-person Election Committee for each breed voted on the list of finalists in the selected categories. The following people and horses are named to the CHRHF Class of 2024 which will be formally inducted in a ceremony on Wednesday, Aug. 7.
Born on December 20, 1946 in British Columbia, the late Glen Todd, fell in love with horse racing as a child, attending the races with his father who had met Glen’s mother at Hastings racecourse in 1939.
“There is a lot of history of racing in my family,” he said.
Todd quickly immersed himself in everything about preparing a racehorse, educating himself from the shedrow up. Todd was an exceptional businessman who took over his father Jack and mother Eileen’s Pacific Group of Companies, founded in 1954. Todd began training horses at Hastings in the early 1970s, doing so until 1985. In 2011, he won the Sovereign Award in a tie with Donver Stables for Canada’s Outstanding Owner. Throughout his life he was an owner of hundreds of racehorses.
Behind the racing headlines, Todd worked tirelessly to promote and improve the B.C. racing industry. In 2009, he was part of the B.C. Horse Racing Industry Management Committee which was formed to revitalize the sport and put it on firmer financial ground. He also extended an interest-free $1-million loan to fund purse money and keep races going at east Vancouver’s Hastings Racecourse over the summer of 2021, and at the time he said he was not looking for accolades, just that he wanted to keep jobs in place and horses running. He has been described as an owner, trainer, breeder, builder, innovator, communicator, betting shop owner, employer, mentor, and friend.
Husbands went on to capture eight Sovereign Awards as Canada’s Champion jockey from 1999-2014. His initial popularity came among the local Bajan community but quickly grew to universal acceptance with each passing race victory and ensuing championship season. Of Husbands’ countless achievements, one of the most noted came in 2003 with his expert handling of Triple Crown winner and future Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame Inductee, Wando, for the late Gustav Schickendanz and trainer Mike Keogh, both Honoured Members of the Hall.
Additionally, CHRHF Honoured Member, Mark Casse has been a strong supporter of Husbands, with Hall of Fame horse Sealy Hill, 2023 King’s Plate winner Paramount Prince as well as Queen’s Plate winner Lexie Lou, who was inducted to the CHRHF in 2019. Throughout his spectacular career Husbands has won 3,630 times earning $178,477,012 USD through the end of 2023.
Channel Maker is the 3rd richest Canadian-bred racehorse of all time with earnings over $3.9 million. He raced an incredible 8 years, from age 2-9, and set the record for the most Breeders’ Cup starts by any single horse – a record 6 times. He won the 2017 Sovereign Award as Canada’s champion 3-year-old colt and the 2020 Eclipse Award as North America’s top turf male. In 2020, the durable gelding swept 2 prestigious Grade 1 races – the Sword Dancer S and Joe Hirsch Turf Classic, to become an Eclipse Award winner as Turf Male Horse. Following his retirement from racing in 2023, Channel Maker was donated by his connections to Old Friends Retirement Farm in Kentucky where he now resides.
In 1994, Vella captured nineteen Woodbine stakes in an outstanding season headed by Queen’s Plate winner Basqueian, King Ruckus, Champion Sprinter and Honky Tonk Tune. Fifteen more Woodbine stakes were won in 1996 giving Vella fifty-eight added money wins in an outstanding three-year stretch. Other stakes winners trained by him include Cash Ticket, Phantom Light, Knights Templar, Field Commission, and most recently, Alpha Bettor.
In 2012, Vella transformed Wally and Terry Leong’s Strait of Dover into a poly track winner with a victory in the Marine. Vella’s statistics during a training career that concluded in 2022 include 5,740 starts (869-841-7) and earnings of $39,438,727.
In 1967 he was Canada’s leading Jockey with 230 victories. That same year he won seven straight races on an eight-race card, a feat never duplicated. Grubb rode some of the country’s most time-honoured stars including Mary of Scotland, and Rouletabille and 1968 Horse of the Year, Viceregal.
Among his stakes wins was the 25th edition of the Manitoba Derby in 1973 aboard Zaca Spirit. During his career, Grubb won over 100 major races and was presented the Avelino Gomez Memorial Award in 1997. Following his retirement from racing in 1989, he became a senior Steward with the Ontario Racing Commission, a position in which he served for 24 years.
Her tenure at Canada’s preeminent Standardbred breeding operation, Armbro Farms, began in January 1988 as the farm veterinarian. Gunn ascended to Manager, Vice-President, and from 2000 to 2004, President, following her mentor, Dr. Glen Brown.
Other positions held in the industry include Director of the E.P. Taylor Equine Research Fund, Co-Chair of Equine Guelph Advisory Council, President of the Standardbred Breeders of Ontario, Director/Vice-President of Canadian Standardbred Horse Society with multiple committee appointments, and Director of Ontario Horse Racing Industry Association and Standardbred Canada.
She was heavily involved in the amalgamation of the Canadian Standardbred Horse Society and the Canadian Trotting Association to form Standardbred Canada. As part of Paradox Farm, Dr. Gunn was a breeder of both Standardbreds and Thoroughbreds, including Queen’s Plate winner, Lexie Lou. After her time at Armbro Farms, Dr. Gunn operated a private equine practice specializing in stallion management, embryo transfer and freezing, and she specialized in reproductive challenges of hard to breed mares.
To date, Moore has trained the winners of over $23 million and has averaged over $1 million per year racing mostly in Ontario, including a personal record of $3.1 million in 2023. He has not only accomplished his feat racing mostly in Canada, but he has also done it while averaging a stable size of only 10-15 horses. Dr. Moore’s training accomplishments include an impressive 69 horses that have each earned over $100,000, 14 horses with earnings over $500,000, 20 horses that have earned over $75,000, and seven horses that have earned over $1,000,000 – including one that earned over $3,000,000.
Among the stable stars he has trained are Astronomical, Malicious, State Treasurer, Arthur Blue Chip, Rockin In Heaven, Percy Bluechip, Century Farroh, Lawless Shadow, Stockade Seelster, Tattoo Artist and CHRHF 2022 Inductee Shadow Play, who has gone on to a be a an outstanding sire of some of today’s top race horses. He has received 15 O’Brien Awards, including twice for Horsemanship and the Trainer of the Year title in 2023.
‘Cowboy’ Curran was the leading dash winner from 1964 to 1973 in Ontario and had an average winning percentage of .317 over a 10-year period. He was rated the second and third best driver in North America from his performance in those years. In his 8686 career starts, he finished in the top three almost fifty percent of the time based on his universal driver rating system stats. He drove 1,711 recorded winners and had over $2.7 million in recorded lifetime earnings. Curran was inducted in the Sportsman Hall of Fame in Smiths Falls, Ontario in 1988 and he was given the Living Legend Award by the Ontario Harness Horse Association in 2009. He had proven successful partnerships with horses like JJs Tequila and owners such as John Grant. He was known not only for his driving ability but he was one of the top trainers as well.
