Mighty Heart, one-eyed winner of the $1M Queen's Plate, has N.S. ties
‘He blew me out of the water,’ says Cape Breton-born groom
The winner of the $1-million Queen's Plate, a one-eyed colt called Mighty Heart, has a Nova Scotia connection — the horse's groom is from Cape Breton.
Mighty Heart won the opening leg of the OLG Canadian Triple Crown at Woodbine Racetrack in Toronto on Saturday with a winning time of 2:01.98, the second-fastest since 1957.
His groom, Siobhan Brown of Cape Breton, told CBC Nova Scotia News at Six she was nervous when Mighty Heart first took the lead. The race is long, so endurance is just as crucial as speed.
But Mighty Heart streaked away at the finish, winning by nearly eight lengths.
"The group had kind of started to catch up to him and he had just kicked it into a totally different gear," she said. "He blew me out of the water."
Mighty Heart has run three races with Brown as a groom. He's had only one eye since she's known him — he lost it in a paddock accident when he was just a few weeks old.
A one-eyed horse with a Cape Breton connection won Saturday’s $1-million Queen’s Plate. My chat with his groom is coming up on <a href="https://twitter.com/CBCNS?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@CBCNS</a> at 6 <a href="https://t.co/IKco5YcYxC">pic.twitter.com/IKco5YcYxC</a>
—@amysmithcbc"It took a lot of trust because everything we do is on the left-hand side, and that's the eye he's missing.... But essentially you'd never know he only had one eye," she said.
Brown has groomed horses before, but said Mighty Heart's personality, sense of humour and kindness set him apart from the rest.
"I just love him, he's one of the best horses I have ever groomed," she said.
So what's next in store for the Queen's Plate winner?
"Anything, the sky's the limit … He loves what he does, and he's proved himself," Brown said.