2024 – Driver
The Filion name is synonymous with success in harness racing and this year, driver Sylvain Filion joins his father Yves, and uncle Herve as an honoured member of the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame.
During his impressive career, which spans over four decades to date, the native of Angers, Quebec, has won over 10,000 races and driven horses to more than $140 million in purse money, driving almost exclusively in Canada. Filion began his driving career in 1987, winning his first race at Rideau Carleton Raceway with Supreme Jade. That same year, he guided Runnymede Lobell to a victory in a qualifying race at Blue Bonnets. Runnymede Lobell would go on to win 31 races, more than $1.5 million in purse money and the 1988 North America Cup with Yves in the sulky and Sylvain as the trainer. It was the first time a horse owned and trained by Quebecers had won Canada’s richest harness race.
Sylvain would return as a driver in the 2002 North America Cup, teaming up with his father’s trainee, Goliath Bayama for a runner-up finish. Sylvain was his regular driver during his $1.5 million career that included victories in the Breeders Crown and US Pacing Championship.
For a brief period in the late 1990s, he tested the waters on the Woodbine circuit before returning permanently in 2008 and has lived in Milton since that time with his wife Dominic and their daughter, Stella-Rose.
In 1999, he won the World Driving Championship title in Australia as Canada’s representative.
Honoured with the first of his four O’Brien Awards as Canada’s Driver of the Year in 2012, he had an exceptional season that included 434 wins and a personal best of $8.6 million in purse earnings. Filion was the regular driver for Wheeling N Dealin, voted Canada’s Two-Year-Old Trotting Colt of the Year, and he won his first Lampman Cup as the leading driver in the Ontario Sires Stakes.
Three O’Briens followed for national driving honours in 2013, 2015 and 2016 as Filion was at the top of the standings for purse earnings, and he also secured the Lampman Cup for each of those seasons.
His richest win of the 2013 season came with Boomboom Ballykeel in the $683,00 Metro Pace. At Toronto’s highly successful Horse Day event in June at Exhibition Place, he represented harness racing as an honourary guest.
During his 2015 O’Brien Award winning season, he drove top stakes performers Emoticon Hanover, Intimidate who won an O’Brien as Older Trotting Horse of the Year, Sandbetweenurtoes, and Wrangler Magic
In 2016, he was the regular reinsman for O’Brien winner and Metro Pace winner Beyond Delight, as well as O’Brien Award finalists Emoticon Hanover and Yaris Bayama. He scored a driving triple on OSS Super Final night while teaming up with Yaris Bayama, Warrawee Roo and Emoticon Hanover for victories. October 31 of that same year, Sylvain surpassed $100 million in career earnings.
Sylvain continues to compete at the highest level and shows no signs of slowing down as evident in October 2023 when he put his name in the history books as the first Canadian-based driver in harness racing history to reach 10,000 career wins.