WIN­NIPEG – Trinida­di­an Stan­ley Chadee Jr won twice to lead a hand­ful of Caribbean suc­cess­es on the sev­en-race card at Assini­boia Downs in , Man­i­to­ba on Mon­day night.

The 31-year-old cap­tured the day’s open­er in the coun­try’s west­ern re­gion with favourite Clairessence be­fore fol­low­ing up in race six with an­oth­er favourite Musko­ka.

Chadee lies fourth in the ear­ly sea­son stand­ings with nine wins, four off leader Jorge Car­reno, with the Ja­maican pair of Neville Stephen­son and Leroy Nel­son tied in sec­ond on 10 wins.

Both were al­so suc­cess­ful on the day’s card. Vet­er­an Stephen­son, 53, tast­ed suc­cess in race two over sev­en fur­longs with 4-1 chance Coura­geous, guid­ing the five-year-old bay geld­ing to a 2-½ length win over the three-year-olds and up­ward.

And Nel­son, 41, al­so re­mained in touch with the lead­ers by pair­ing with favourite Re­al Grace in a gate-to-wire ef­fort to dis­miss the three-year-old and up­wards by 3-½ lengths, al­so over sev­en fur­longs.

An­oth­er Ja­maican jock­ey Dwight Lewis, 49, in his first ever cam­paign at Assini­boia, got in on the act in a 5-½ fur­long sprint in race sev­en when he won for Bar­ba­di­an train­er Steve Gaskin, car­ry­ing 14-1 out­sider Rocky Bar­ba­dos to a three-quar­ter length, front-run­ning vic­to­ry over the three-year-olds and up­wards.

How­ev­er, Chadee took the plau­dits, to con­tin­ue his strong form af­ter a sol­id sea­son last year which saw him gar­ner 48 wins to fin­ish sec­ond in the stand­ings.

His open­ing win was dom­i­nant, bring­ing the five-year-old brown mare Clairessence from a stalk­ing po­si­tion to trounce the three-year-old and up­ward fil­lies and mares by 5-¼ lengths.

Go­ing sev­en fur­longs, Chadee sat Clairessence off the ear­ly du­el be­tween Val­len­tay and Christ­mas Dance be­fore bid­ding on the turn, putting away Val­len­tay in the stretch and storm­ing to the wire.

Chadee’s sec­ond win came over six fur­longs when he part­nered with the five-year-old brown geld­ing Musko­ka to thrash the three-year-old and up­ward maid­ens by 2-¼ lengths.

Five-to-one choice Ex­hi Kid led through the ear­ly frac­tions un­der pres­sure from Chadee who then chal­lenged off the turn be­fore carv­ing out a clear lead in mid-stretch.

CMC