Colin Mello began the new year at Vesey Street just as he had ended the previous one at the very top of his game.The elite harness driver was virtually flawless during New Year’s Day racing which saw him put an end to a five-year drought in the popular stakes races.Mello won two divisions in the stakes races competing with two separate horses.He won the two-year-old title with Aaron Sims’ Real Lady Like and the aged crown with his stud Big Red Machine on combined average time to add to an already remarkable season.“I could not have asked for a better day,” Mello said. “Four wins and then two stakes races is pretty good.“It’s been a good season so far and I can’t complain.”Mello’s stud Big Red Machine shattered his own track record (1.0¼) last month to place himself firmly among the favourites in the aged stakes races.With everyone gunning for him, Mello admitted that the pressure was on him to live up to expectations heading into the stakes races.“When you are going in as the favourite there is always more pressure on you because you are racing with a target on your back,” he said. “You are the one everybody wants to beat and the one everyone is watching.”Mello thanked Sims for allowing him the opportunity to compete in the four-year-old stakes races with his mare (Real Lady Like).“I really appreciate Aaron for letting me drive because there are a lot of other people down there he could’ve asked instead,” he said.In the remaining stakes races, Arnold and Robin Manders’ filly Colonel’s Finest won the two-year-old title with Darico Clarke at the helm, while Andy Stoneham’s colt What a Sensation captured the three-year-old crown respectively.Joe Vieira failed in his bid to defend his crown in the three-year-old stakes races after being set back in the second heat for impeding on another driver.Vieira’s protest against the race committee’s ruling was later rejected.Among the double heat winners during regular racing were rookie Brandon Lopes (LA Erma Time), Arthur Hurst (Colonel’s J), Aaron Sims (Imagine That), Samantha Hayward (Red Grand) and Jorde Smith (Major Medicine).Stoneham also won two heats competing in the stakes races, which had to be rescheduled from Boxing Day after rain flooded the racetrack.