SOUTHERN ELECTRIC SETS TRACK RECORD AT 350 YARDS FOR PAINTS, WINNING $20,000 PAUL HARBER MEMORIAL STAKES

Oklahoma City, OK – April 10 – It doesn’t matter who owners Dan and Kaye Jones send out in the Paul Harber Memorial Stakes at Remington Park each year; they know how to win this race.

On Friday night, it was Southern Electric, and all he did was set the track record for Paints at 350 yards in the race.

For the second year in a row, jockey Andrew Samaniego was aboard for the Joneses of Kemp, Texas, and for trainer Matt Whitekiller. Oddly enough, the horse Samaniego won this race with last year, Live Moonshine, also trained by Whitekiller, was in this year’s field and the jock beat him with Southern Electric. On Friday, Southern Electric, a 4-year-old gelded son of Crm Livewire, out of the Southern Cartel (QH) mare Ze Southern Girl (QH), stopped the timer at 350 yards in :17.185 seconds. That dusted the old record of :17.232 set by The Cock of the Walk in 2010. It was Whitekiller’s fourth win in the stakes and second consecutive year for the Joneses and Samaniego.

“Southern Electric ran the best race of his life,” said Whitekiller. “Just a huge race. I think Live Moonshine needed a race. Sometimes older horses just need an out when they’ve been off that long.”

Live Moonshine hadn’t run since Nov. 14 at Will Rogers Downs in Claremore last year, the last race that Southern Electric ran in before Friday. Southern Electric is 4 years old and Live Moonshine is 5 years old.

Southern Electric was no less than electric, hitting the wire 1-3/4 lengths in front. He earned a 101 speed index with the track record. The longshot Snow Advisory (16-1) got up for second for a 92 SI and Live Moonshine, the 2-1 favorite, ran third another half-length behind. Southern Electric had only gone off higher than 5-2 odds once in his last 10 races, but on Friday, he was a generous 3-1 price at the windows. He paid $8, $4.40 and $2.60 across the board. The winner earned $11,850 from the $20,450 purse and improved his career record to 20 starts, 12 wins, three seconds and two thirds for a total bankroll of $246,821. Southern Electric was bred in Texas by the owners.

At the end of the night, Dee Keener, the all-time winningest trainer in Paint history, had 329 career victories to Whitekiller’s 327. Keener and Whitekiller were both chasing the late, great King of Paints, Lew Wartchow, for years and finally passed him in 2020. Wartchow finished his career with 321 wins. He hit his mark and held onto it for quite a while before the two pups finally caught him. Wartchow had passed the 300-win mark starting only 1,485 horses in his career. That’s some 500 fewer horses than Keener and 700 fewer than Whitekiller.