Dave Palone, of Washington, PA, has won harness racing’s highest driving honor – Harness Tracks of America’s Driver of the Year – for the second straight season and fourth time in the last six years.

Catello (Cat) Manzi of New Jersey, who races primarily at the Meadowlands and Freehold Raceway, was second, and Jeff Gregory, a regular at Yonkers Raceway in New York, was third.

Palone, 42, perennial driving champion at The Meadows near Pittsburgh, won the HTA title by finishing first in wins in North America with 669 driving victories, first in percentage standings with a .425 in-the-money average, and 13th in money winning with $4,676,309 earned by his mounts. That gave him 88 points under HTA’s scoring system, which awards 25 points for finishing first in each category down to 1 for finishing 25th, and a 25 point bonus for finishing in the top 25 in all three. Manzi earned 75 points, Gregory 62, and Stephane Bouchard, the 2001 champion, was fourth with 59.

The difficulty of that accomplishment is underscored by the fact that those four drivers were the only ones, of 5,181 who drove in North America last year, who were able to finish in the top 25 in all three categories.