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Harness Racing / Re: Ian Moore is the Greatest Trainer since Billy Haughton, Maybe
« Last post by TimTimTimbo on September 23, 2026, 10:48:49 PM »I had to correct Chat GPT when he said Moore was also born in NZ and I did not know that he was born in Sheffield England
Absolutely. Brett Pelling is a fascinating comparison with Ian Moore, especially because both are New Zealand-born horsemen who made enormous names for themselves in North America, but their approaches and the kinds of horses they handled were somewhat different.
I checked the historical records rather than just relying on memory. One thing to flag up front: Pelling did not personally buy every great horse he trained, so for each horse I'll distinguish between purchase price known and trained by Pelling but purchased/owned by someone else.
Brett Pelling the career
Pelling was born in Mataura, New Zealand, in 1958. He became a dominant trainer in North America during the late 1990s and early 2000s, left racing and moved back to Australia in 2006, then returned to New Jersey in 2017. His comeback produced another extraordinary group of horses.
He won the Dan Patch Trainer of the Year in 1998 and has accumulated 13 Breeders Crown victories, which puts him tied for fourth all-time among trainers.
His stable at its peak was enormous by comparison with Moore's: around 50 racing horses plus another 15 potential horses, and the stable was averaging roughly $5 million annually during the height of his first American career.
The Pelling horses
1. The Panderosa $250,000 → $2.3 million
This is a great one to start with.
Purchase price: $250,000
In 1997, The Panderosa was purchased for $250,000. He went on to earn approximately $2.3 million, including the $1 million Meadowlands Pace.
Pelling trained him and turned him into one of the great stallions of his era.
That's:
$250,000 → $2.3 million
Not a bargain like Shadow Play, but an enormous racing return.
And Pelling himself has talked extensively about The Panderosa and the infamous controversy surrounding the horse, which is one of the reasons Pelling's career has a few more complicated chapters than Moore's.
2. Rocknroll Hanover $190,000 → $2.754 million
This is probably Pelling's signature horse.
Purchase price: $190,000
Jeffrey Snyder bought Rocknroll Hanover at Harrisburg for $190,000 in 2003.
Pelling trained him.
And at three he became spectacular:
Meadowlands Pace
North America Cup
Breeders Crown
2005 Horse of the Year
Lifetime earnings: $2,754,038
Record: 1:48.3
So:
$190,000 → $2.754 million
And then there's the part that makes Rocknroll even more important: he became a hugely influential sire.
Pelling has said Rocknroll was probably the best horse he ever trained until Papi Rob came along.
3. Western Ideal no sale price; $1.455 million
This one is interesting because Pelling didn't develop him from a yearling.
Western Ideal was bred and retained by Brittany Farms. He had already been a very good 2-year-old for Gene Riegle and suffered a serious tendon injury.
Pelling picked him up when he was four.
He subsequently earned:
$1,455,422
and took a 1:48 record.
His major wins included:
Breeders Crown
William Haughton Memorial
Canadian Pacing Derby
Graduate Series
And Pelling considered Western Ideal one of the three best horses he'd ever trained, along with Rocknroll Hanover and Papi Rob.
4. Armbro Operative
This is one of the horses that really established Pelling as a major trainer.
He won the 1996 Little Brown Jug and 1996 Breeders Crown, among other major races.
What's interesting is that Pelling specifically remembered him as a horse with a lot of problems but tremendous ability when the money was on the line.
Pelling said they raced him nine times for purses of $100,000 or more and he won every one of those races.
That's classic Pelling.
5. Shady Character
This was another huge Pelling 3-year-old.
1998 Little Brown Jug winner
He also won:
Cane Pace
Art Rooney Pace
New Jersey Classic
two legs of the Pacing Triple Crown
Career earnings:
$1,225,905
And 1998 was one of the greatest years of Pelling's career.
He actually swept the Jug and Jugette eliminations and finals that year.
His horses included:
Shady Character Little Brown Jug
Armbro Romance Jugette
Pan Yankees Jugette
Pelling himself has called that 1998 Jug/Jugette achievement one of his proudest accomplishments.
6. Armbro Romance
This is another horse that fits the Pelling r้sum้ perfectly.
She became the first female pacer to break 1:50, pacing 1:49.4 in 1998.
Her career earnings were:
$794,375
She was one of Pelling's great pacing fillies and was the horse who made that extraordinary 1998 Jugette campaign possible.
7. Juliet's Fate $55,000 → major stakes winner
Here's a horse with an actual purchase price.
$55,000 yearling
Allen and Connie Skolnick's Southwind Farms bought Juliet's Fate for $55,000.
Pelling trained her to the:
1998 Breeders Crown 2-Year-Old Filly Pace
She won six of nine that season and set a national season's mark of 1:52.
So this is another example of Pelling taking a relatively modestly priced yearling and putting her into a Breeders Crown winner's circle.
8. Caviart Ally
This one is particularly important because she represents Pelling's comeback.
She was already an accomplished mare when she joined Pelling's stable in 2019, so she was not a Pelling purchase.
But look what he did with her.
Career:
87 starts 28 wins 23 seconds 15 thirds
$1,974,971
She won the:
2019 Breeders Crown Mare Pace
2019 Milton Stakes
Blue Chip Matchmaker
numerous major mare stakes
She finished her career just $25,029 short of $2 million.
And she went out a winner.
9. Test Of Faith $92,000 → $2.416 million
Now THIS is one that belongs in the Pelling bargain book.
Test Of Faith was bought at Harrisburg in 2019 for:
$92,000
Mel Segal bought her after having Pelling inspect her.
Pelling trained her.
And she became:
2021 Horse of the Year
Her career earnings ended at:
$2,416,011
with a world-record 1:47.
So:
$92,000 → $2.416 million
That's approximately 26 times the purchase price in purse earnings.
That's a hell of a horse.
10. Papi Rob Hanover
This is the horse Pelling himself says was the best horse he ever trained.
And I wouldn't classify him as a bargain because he was bred by Hanover Shoe Farms and was a highly regarded horse.
Papi Rob earned more than $1 million and set a world record of 1:47.1 on a 5/8-mile track.
The really sad part is that his career ended because of a freak accident. Pelling said he believed Papi Rob could have broken numerous records had he remained healthy.
Pelling has continued to have a particular interest in Papi Rob's offspring.
11. Confederate HOME BRED → $2,077,554
This is Pelling's other modern masterpiece.
And there's no auction price.
Confederate was:
Diamond Creek homebred
Pelling trained him.
At three:
15 starts 13 wins 1 second
He won:
Meadowlands Pace
Breeders Crown
Cane Pace
Max Hempt
Tattersalls
Kentucky Sires Stakes Championship
And he paced 1:46.1, which at the time was the fastest 3-year-old pacing mile ever.
Lifetime earnings:
$2,077,554
So in this case:
Homebred → $2.078 million
And Pelling said Confederate was faster than any other horse he'd ever been around.
12. Allywag Hanover
Another very good modern Pelling horse.
He was a Hanover Shoe Farms yearling sold at the 2018 Standardbred Horse Sale and eventually became a 1:46 horse.
Career earnings:
$1,888,581
Pelling trained him for Allywag Stable.
I haven't found a sufficiently reliable source yet giving me the exact auction price, so I'm not going to invent one.
The really interesting comparison: Moore vs. Pelling
This is where I think your original observation about Ian Moore gets really interesting.
Ian Moore
Some of Moore's astonishing purchases:
Horse Purchase Earnings
State Treasurer $6,500 $2M+
Shadow Play $16,000 $1.55M
Century Farroh $17,000 ~$1.3M
Clever Cody $24,000 $546K
Beau Jangles $65,000 $2.036M+
Brett Pelling
Horse Purchase Earnings
Juliet's Fate $55,000 major stakes winner
Test Of Faith $92,000 $2.416M
Rocknroll Hanover $190,000 $2.754M
The Panderosa $250,000 ~$2.3M
Confederate homebred $2.078M
Caviart Ally not Pelling purchase $1.975M
Western Ideal not Pelling purchase $1.455M
Shady Character purchase price not verified $1.226M
And there's a major difference:
Moore is particularly fascinating as a buyer.
Pelling's genius was much more often taking an already valuable horse and turning it into a champion, although he certainly had some outstanding buys of his own.
Pelling's r้sum้ is also almost absurd when you look at the championship races. He has 13 Breeders Crown wins, and his horses have won the Meadowlands Pace five times, including Confederate in 2023.
And one thing I think you'll especially appreciate: Pelling himself says Rocknroll Hanover was his best horse, while Ian Moore's r้sum้ has Shadow Play as the obvious centerpiece. Both were New Zealand-born trainers who found their way to North America and became major figures in American/Canadian pacing.
If you want, I can do the really fun version next:
Pelling's 20 greatest horses ranked only by achievement year, purchase price, earnings, major stakes wins, record, and what happened to the horse afterward. That would include The Panderosa, Rocknroll Hanover, Western Ideal, Armbro Operative, Shady Character, Armbro Romance, Mystical Maddy, Test Of Faith, Papi Rob, Caviart Ally, Allywag and Confederate, among others.
Wasn't moore born in Canada
You're right to question that. I misstated it earlier.
Dr. Ian Moore was born in Sheffield, England, not Canada. His parents were British, and the family moved to Montreal when Ian was four. He then moved east and grew up on Prince Edward Island, which is why he's generally regarded as a PEI/Canadian horseman.
So the accurate version is:
🇬🇧 Born: Sheffield, England
🇨🇦 Moved to Canada: age 4, Montreal
🇨🇦 Raised: Prince Edward Island
🐴 Started in harness racing: around age 12 at Summerside Raceway
🎓 Veterinarian: graduated from Ontario Veterinary College in 1982
🇨🇦 Canadian horseman: absolutely his entire racing identity and career are overwhelmingly Canadian.
And there's a neat detail: his father was also a veterinarian, and Ian eventually followed that path while continuing to train horses. His early horses actually helped pay his way through veterinary school.
So when I said earlier that both Moore and Pelling were New Zealand-born, that was wrong. Pelling is the New Zealand-born one; Moore is English-born but Canadian-raised.
And honestly, that makes Moore's story even more interesting a British-born kid who grows up on PEI, gets hooked on harness racing at 12, becomes a veterinarian, and eventually becomes one of Canada's greatest trainers.
Absolutely. Brett Pelling is a fascinating comparison with Ian Moore, especially because both are New Zealand-born horsemen who made enormous names for themselves in North America, but their approaches and the kinds of horses they handled were somewhat different.
I checked the historical records rather than just relying on memory. One thing to flag up front: Pelling did not personally buy every great horse he trained, so for each horse I'll distinguish between purchase price known and trained by Pelling but purchased/owned by someone else.
Brett Pelling the career
Pelling was born in Mataura, New Zealand, in 1958. He became a dominant trainer in North America during the late 1990s and early 2000s, left racing and moved back to Australia in 2006, then returned to New Jersey in 2017. His comeback produced another extraordinary group of horses.
He won the Dan Patch Trainer of the Year in 1998 and has accumulated 13 Breeders Crown victories, which puts him tied for fourth all-time among trainers.
His stable at its peak was enormous by comparison with Moore's: around 50 racing horses plus another 15 potential horses, and the stable was averaging roughly $5 million annually during the height of his first American career.
The Pelling horses
1. The Panderosa $250,000 → $2.3 million
This is a great one to start with.
Purchase price: $250,000
In 1997, The Panderosa was purchased for $250,000. He went on to earn approximately $2.3 million, including the $1 million Meadowlands Pace.
Pelling trained him and turned him into one of the great stallions of his era.
That's:
$250,000 → $2.3 million
Not a bargain like Shadow Play, but an enormous racing return.
And Pelling himself has talked extensively about The Panderosa and the infamous controversy surrounding the horse, which is one of the reasons Pelling's career has a few more complicated chapters than Moore's.
2. Rocknroll Hanover $190,000 → $2.754 million
This is probably Pelling's signature horse.
Purchase price: $190,000
Jeffrey Snyder bought Rocknroll Hanover at Harrisburg for $190,000 in 2003.
Pelling trained him.
And at three he became spectacular:
Meadowlands Pace
North America Cup
Breeders Crown
2005 Horse of the Year
Lifetime earnings: $2,754,038
Record: 1:48.3
So:
$190,000 → $2.754 million
And then there's the part that makes Rocknroll even more important: he became a hugely influential sire.
Pelling has said Rocknroll was probably the best horse he ever trained until Papi Rob came along.
3. Western Ideal no sale price; $1.455 million
This one is interesting because Pelling didn't develop him from a yearling.
Western Ideal was bred and retained by Brittany Farms. He had already been a very good 2-year-old for Gene Riegle and suffered a serious tendon injury.
Pelling picked him up when he was four.
He subsequently earned:
$1,455,422
and took a 1:48 record.
His major wins included:
Breeders Crown
William Haughton Memorial
Canadian Pacing Derby
Graduate Series
And Pelling considered Western Ideal one of the three best horses he'd ever trained, along with Rocknroll Hanover and Papi Rob.
4. Armbro Operative
This is one of the horses that really established Pelling as a major trainer.
He won the 1996 Little Brown Jug and 1996 Breeders Crown, among other major races.
What's interesting is that Pelling specifically remembered him as a horse with a lot of problems but tremendous ability when the money was on the line.
Pelling said they raced him nine times for purses of $100,000 or more and he won every one of those races.
That's classic Pelling.
5. Shady Character
This was another huge Pelling 3-year-old.
1998 Little Brown Jug winner
He also won:
Cane Pace
Art Rooney Pace
New Jersey Classic
two legs of the Pacing Triple Crown
Career earnings:
$1,225,905
And 1998 was one of the greatest years of Pelling's career.
He actually swept the Jug and Jugette eliminations and finals that year.
His horses included:
Shady Character Little Brown Jug
Armbro Romance Jugette
Pan Yankees Jugette
Pelling himself has called that 1998 Jug/Jugette achievement one of his proudest accomplishments.
6. Armbro Romance
This is another horse that fits the Pelling r้sum้ perfectly.
She became the first female pacer to break 1:50, pacing 1:49.4 in 1998.
Her career earnings were:
$794,375
She was one of Pelling's great pacing fillies and was the horse who made that extraordinary 1998 Jugette campaign possible.
7. Juliet's Fate $55,000 → major stakes winner
Here's a horse with an actual purchase price.
$55,000 yearling
Allen and Connie Skolnick's Southwind Farms bought Juliet's Fate for $55,000.
Pelling trained her to the:
1998 Breeders Crown 2-Year-Old Filly Pace
She won six of nine that season and set a national season's mark of 1:52.
So this is another example of Pelling taking a relatively modestly priced yearling and putting her into a Breeders Crown winner's circle.
8. Caviart Ally
This one is particularly important because she represents Pelling's comeback.
She was already an accomplished mare when she joined Pelling's stable in 2019, so she was not a Pelling purchase.
But look what he did with her.
Career:
87 starts 28 wins 23 seconds 15 thirds
$1,974,971
She won the:
2019 Breeders Crown Mare Pace
2019 Milton Stakes
Blue Chip Matchmaker
numerous major mare stakes
She finished her career just $25,029 short of $2 million.
And she went out a winner.
9. Test Of Faith $92,000 → $2.416 million
Now THIS is one that belongs in the Pelling bargain book.
Test Of Faith was bought at Harrisburg in 2019 for:
$92,000
Mel Segal bought her after having Pelling inspect her.
Pelling trained her.
And she became:
2021 Horse of the Year
Her career earnings ended at:
$2,416,011
with a world-record 1:47.
So:
$92,000 → $2.416 million
That's approximately 26 times the purchase price in purse earnings.
That's a hell of a horse.
10. Papi Rob Hanover
This is the horse Pelling himself says was the best horse he ever trained.
And I wouldn't classify him as a bargain because he was bred by Hanover Shoe Farms and was a highly regarded horse.
Papi Rob earned more than $1 million and set a world record of 1:47.1 on a 5/8-mile track.
The really sad part is that his career ended because of a freak accident. Pelling said he believed Papi Rob could have broken numerous records had he remained healthy.
Pelling has continued to have a particular interest in Papi Rob's offspring.
11. Confederate HOME BRED → $2,077,554
This is Pelling's other modern masterpiece.
And there's no auction price.
Confederate was:
Diamond Creek homebred
Pelling trained him.
At three:
15 starts 13 wins 1 second
He won:
Meadowlands Pace
Breeders Crown
Cane Pace
Max Hempt
Tattersalls
Kentucky Sires Stakes Championship
And he paced 1:46.1, which at the time was the fastest 3-year-old pacing mile ever.
Lifetime earnings:
$2,077,554
So in this case:
Homebred → $2.078 million
And Pelling said Confederate was faster than any other horse he'd ever been around.
12. Allywag Hanover
Another very good modern Pelling horse.
He was a Hanover Shoe Farms yearling sold at the 2018 Standardbred Horse Sale and eventually became a 1:46 horse.
Career earnings:
$1,888,581
Pelling trained him for Allywag Stable.
I haven't found a sufficiently reliable source yet giving me the exact auction price, so I'm not going to invent one.
The really interesting comparison: Moore vs. Pelling
This is where I think your original observation about Ian Moore gets really interesting.
Ian Moore
Some of Moore's astonishing purchases:
Horse Purchase Earnings
State Treasurer $6,500 $2M+
Shadow Play $16,000 $1.55M
Century Farroh $17,000 ~$1.3M
Clever Cody $24,000 $546K
Beau Jangles $65,000 $2.036M+
Brett Pelling
Horse Purchase Earnings
Juliet's Fate $55,000 major stakes winner
Test Of Faith $92,000 $2.416M
Rocknroll Hanover $190,000 $2.754M
The Panderosa $250,000 ~$2.3M
Confederate homebred $2.078M
Caviart Ally not Pelling purchase $1.975M
Western Ideal not Pelling purchase $1.455M
Shady Character purchase price not verified $1.226M
And there's a major difference:
Moore is particularly fascinating as a buyer.
Pelling's genius was much more often taking an already valuable horse and turning it into a champion, although he certainly had some outstanding buys of his own.
Pelling's r้sum้ is also almost absurd when you look at the championship races. He has 13 Breeders Crown wins, and his horses have won the Meadowlands Pace five times, including Confederate in 2023.
And one thing I think you'll especially appreciate: Pelling himself says Rocknroll Hanover was his best horse, while Ian Moore's r้sum้ has Shadow Play as the obvious centerpiece. Both were New Zealand-born trainers who found their way to North America and became major figures in American/Canadian pacing.
If you want, I can do the really fun version next:
Pelling's 20 greatest horses ranked only by achievement year, purchase price, earnings, major stakes wins, record, and what happened to the horse afterward. That would include The Panderosa, Rocknroll Hanover, Western Ideal, Armbro Operative, Shady Character, Armbro Romance, Mystical Maddy, Test Of Faith, Papi Rob, Caviart Ally, Allywag and Confederate, among others.
Wasn't moore born in Canada
You're right to question that. I misstated it earlier.
Dr. Ian Moore was born in Sheffield, England, not Canada. His parents were British, and the family moved to Montreal when Ian was four. He then moved east and grew up on Prince Edward Island, which is why he's generally regarded as a PEI/Canadian horseman.
So the accurate version is:
🇬🇧 Born: Sheffield, England
🇨🇦 Moved to Canada: age 4, Montreal
🇨🇦 Raised: Prince Edward Island
🐴 Started in harness racing: around age 12 at Summerside Raceway
🎓 Veterinarian: graduated from Ontario Veterinary College in 1982
🇨🇦 Canadian horseman: absolutely his entire racing identity and career are overwhelmingly Canadian.
And there's a neat detail: his father was also a veterinarian, and Ian eventually followed that path while continuing to train horses. His early horses actually helped pay his way through veterinary school.
So when I said earlier that both Moore and Pelling were New Zealand-born, that was wrong. Pelling is the New Zealand-born one; Moore is English-born but Canadian-raised.
And honestly, that makes Moore's story even more interesting a British-born kid who grows up on PEI, gets hooked on harness racing at 12, becomes a veterinarian, and eventually becomes one of Canada's greatest trainers.
