A Virtual Day at the Races

A few days ago I saw a Tweet from someone asking if anyone out there would share how they watched the races back in the '80s if they weren't at the track. Obviously this was asked by someone who is a lot younger than myself, for as anyone knows, you didn't watch the races in the '80s, '70s, '60s, etc. unless you were at the track. Even OTBs, started in New York City in 1971, eventually only provided a simulated stretch call of the race as the audio contribution to delivering the result.

You read about the races; there were charts of the races in major newspapers; there were entries as well. Over time, these features shrunk, or disappeared. The NYT these days barely reports on racing. The sports page doesn't even include beat reporter stories on the local baseball teams, the Mets and the Yankees. No league standings, either. If you want the information you once got from a newspaper, you have to go to another source these days, usually online. The good news is that it's still there.

It was the dark ages for racing telecasts. No satellite coverage. The only televised racing were the Triple Crown races, and New York's Channel 9 Race of the Week hosted by Frank Wright and Charlsie Canty on Saturdays, produced by Marvin H. Sugarman productions.

Before them, I think Win Elliot was host of the show. If you remember Win Elliot you should have a will made out by now and "do not resuscitate" instructions in someone's hands.

Frank was a trainer from the Midwest circuit who did run horses in New York, with modest to no success. Frank I. Wright. Charlsie had racing bona fides due to being married to Joe Canty, a trainer who enjoyed some success in that era. Joe trained Temperance Hill at 53-1 to a win in the 1980 Belmont, beating Genuine Risk (filly who won the Derby) and Codex (who mugged the filly in the Preakness, ridden by Angel Cordero), the only horse in the race to be wearing caulks for the less than fast surface. I was there that day. I didn't have it.

Frank was instructional. I remember him telling us where the expression "hard boot" came from, a reference to a trainer.  Seems their boots got hard when they dried out after they were up early in the morning and getting wet from the dew on the grass. We also learned about shoeing a horse, and how the farrier files the hoof down and nailed the steel plate, a process that is not at all painful to the horse.

Now, if you know and get the cable channels, or know the sites for Internet streaming, you can watch a race from just about anywhere in real time. And best of all, you can bet and not be at what are now mostly closed OTB parlors, inhabited by the near-insane on day passes from the local psychiatric hospital.

And so it was myself yesterday, satisfying my Saratoga urge to be there with a home printed copy of the 13 race card from the Daily Racing Form. The price has crept us there, ($4.25) but it certainly beats trying to get one of the 5 hard copies delivered to a newsstand in the area, and ones that cost over twice as much. I mean, how many homes in America do not have a printer and several reams of copy paper somewhere in the house?

And before I even made my first bet, I was a winner when I complained to the Racing Form that they blew it when they provided a Closer Look analysis for Saturday's 12th and 13th races using horses that were not the horses entered at Saratoga for those races. It's happened before, but this time I complained via email, got an apology, and a credit for my next purchase. I wonder if the booklet hardcopy was unaffected.

My  plan was to play the feature races, and maybe the last two on the card. I made a ceremonial win and place bet on a D. Wayne Lukas horse in the first race, Track Mate going off at nearly 11-1. The octogenarian Lukas has a few winners at the meet, coming from 2-year-olds. Track Mate fit the hoped for pattern; a Maiden Special Weight race, 2-year-olds, (a Lukas specialty) 6 furlongs, with several unraced horses. Track Mate's one prior start was a respectable 6th place finish over the track, only beaten 5¾ lengths at the beginning of the month. Better form usually kicks in after the first start.

And it did. Track Mate was right up there, looking every bit as the likely winner, until... until the unraced Verifying got involved, an expensive $775,000 Keeneland purchase, sired by Justify and trained by Brad Cox, going off as the 75¢ favorite ridden by Joel Rosario, who at this point was feeling very good after being under the weather the prior week. 

My win/place bet on Track Mate proved the right choice, and I made a few dollars. Hitting the first bet is always pleasing.

I went dormant until the 4th race, only having the winner as part of an exacta that ran 1-4. Not even close there.

The 5th race was named the Forego, a Grade1 7f race with a $600,000 purse. To me, it should be named The Mighty Forego, because after Dr. Fager, Forego was the one horse who could carry weight, run fast, and win. He was one of my favorite horses, and I've held him completely blameless for all these decades for my busted $50 win bet on him in the 1974 Metropolitan Mile at Belmont when Heliodoro Gustines sent him through blistering factions, only to have him finish second to an extreme long shot Arbees Boy who paid $122. I never bet $50 ever again.

There is no NYRA race named in honor of Dr. Fager, but there is a race named for his trainer John A. Nerud who lived to be 102, passing away in 2015.

To me, a 7f race is the hardest race to win and the hardest race to handicap. It is between a sprint and a route. The distance reminds me of the great indoor track runner Martin McGrady, who was a specialist at winning the 600 yard races indoors when there was an indoor track circuit. If there were pari-mutuel wagering on McGrady's 600 yard races, he'd go off at 1/10.

Jackie's Warrior was the formidable favorite in the Forgo. A winner of 12 out of 16 races and $2.6 million, Jackie's Warrior at 4 is sporting the unique record of winning a Grade1 race at Saratoga in each of his three years of racing and going 5 for 5 at Saratoga. Surely was single city for all those multi-leg wagers.

And 7f is hardly his Achilles heel. He'd won 3 out of 4 7f races, and finished 2nd in the one he didn't win. As good as he is, he failed to show up at 50¢ to the dollar in last year's Breeders' Cup 6f sprint, finishing 6th. Del Mar was not to his liking.

No one could make fun of you if you singled Jackie's Warrior, or keyed him in some exotics. His apparent invincibility was there for all to see, as well as the 15¢ to the dollar odds.

I got creative, and looked to #5 Cody's Wish to complete an exacta with Jackie's Warrior. Cody had never won at 7f but had several recent wins at a mile in competitive races, and anytime a horse cuts back from a 11/16 or a mile, to 7f, they deserve a look.  

No one ever bets enough on a winning horse, and my exactas were not as heavy on the 5/3 outcome as they were on the 3/5 outcome. I made money to the race, with Cody's Wish contributing to an $18 win bet, and a $24.60 (for $2) exacta bet. The time was a blistering 1.20.95, after decent early fractions, but a fast 6f split of 1:08.76. The final time was a tick off the track record of 1:20.40 by Darby Creek Road in 1978. Cody's Wish was a tick slower than the track record.  

Trained by Bill Mott and ridden by Junior Alvarado, Cody's Wish ran a spectacular race coming from 6th place to a going away 1¼ length victory.

The refrain of Saratoga being The Graveyard of Champions was heard from many. There were a lot of busted multi-leg wagers after that outcome.

You are in rare air when you run 1:20 anything for 7f. To this day, I will forever remind people that Dr Fager in 1968 ran the 7f Vosburgh Handicap at Aqueduct in 1:20 1/5 (new track record) carrying the staggering impost of 139 pounds, when handicap races were actually handicapped by weight by the racing secretaries. Leveling the competitive playing field was considered achievable if you assigned more weight. I watched that race on Channel 9.

The current Aqueduct track record is now held by Artax at 1:20.04 when he carried a feathery impost of 114 pounds in 1999. No one has ever come close to Dr. Fager's achievement.

Took a break and hit the pps for the 8th race, the H. Allen Jerkens Memorial 7f Grade1 race, once known as The King's Bishop. As the Forego is for older horses, the Jerkens race is strictly for 3-year-olds, and the current sprinting champ of the crop is Jack Christopher, a lightly raced colt who has had only 5 starts before Saturday. 

His last was an experiment in a two-turn race, the 9 furlong Haskell at Monmouth when he lost for the first time. The two-turn experiment will not be repeated. He finished a respectable 3rd, beaten by Cyberknife, finishing two lengths behind the winner.

I left Jack out of my exactas. Dangerous indeed, since Jack's trainer Chad Brown is accomplished enough to not let the Haskell experiment dull his charge. And it didn't. Jack dusted a good field. My Gunite ran a respectable 2nd to Jack, but ignoring Jack certainly cost me.

The Personal Ensign, Grade1 followed, with 5 very good mares entered, rematching Clairiere and Malathaat. To expect another 1-2 finish from those two was not a leap.

The expression goes that races are not run on paper, and when Clairiere broke last and looked like she wanted no part of running yesterday afternoon, a lot of wagers went out the window with that development. She finished last of the 5 horses, never picking up her feet.

Wha' happened? In medicine, it is said that the pathologist, coroner, knows everything, but it is too late for the person on the slab to have anyone do anything to prevent the condition that put them there. The pathologist knows everything. But it's too late for drawing breath.

At the track the chart caller knows all. And reading the chart for the Personal Ensign and how it pertains to Clairiere you now know all:

CLAIRIERE became very fractious in the gate and hit the front of the stall door twice, had the right shoulder of the assistant starter contact the head of the jockey leaving the gate, angled to the rail early, dropped well behind while sluggish on the inside, lagged at the rear under some coaxing, saved ground under stronger encouragement around the final turn, was put to the crop outside the furlong marker and failed to threaten.

When you look at the pps next out, you put a line through that race.

The less said about the Sword Dancer the better for me. A rather typical full field of 10 for a prestige 1½ mile Grade1 turf race, won by the horse who won it last year, Gufo, trained by Christopher Clement and ridden by Joel Rosario. They put blinkers on Gufo after a multi-race absence, and it made a difference.

There was only one horse coming straight from Europe, trained by Aidan O'Brien, Broome, who was sent off as the favorite at $1.55. Broome came with the jet-setting jockey Ryan Moore, the regular rider. But Andy Serling and Jonathon Kinchen had it right in their pre-race analysis: just because the horse is from Europe doesn't mean it's a great horse. It was pointed out by Little Andy that trainer Aidan O'Brien is 0-for-10 at Saratoga in the last 5 years. Broome never threatened, finishing 4th.

Gufo was slightly ignored at $4.40 to $1. Second place was captured by a long shot Mira Mission, really ignored in the betting who went off at nearly 19-1 and completed the $2 exacta for $203. Mira Mission was trained by Ian Wilkes and ridden by Julian Leparoux. Nice work if you had it.

It's not called Travers Day for no reason. The Mid-Summer Derby at a 1¼ is a $1,250,000 Grade1 that helps anoint the 3-year-old of the year.

Chad Brown had three entrants, the winner of the Preakness in Early Voting. Steve Asmussen had Epicenter, a bit of a bridesmaid finishing second in the Derby and the Preakness but the winner of the Jim Dandy over the track at Saratoga. Any handicapper will tell you a win over the day's surface counts.

Bill Mott had an entrant, Gilded Age; Brad Cox had Cyberknife, the winner of the Grade1 Haskell; Kelly Von Hemel had Ain't Life Grand, and Eric Reed had Rich Strike, the Kentucky Derby winner at nearly 80-1 that stunned the horse racing world.

Despite the Derby win at today's distance, Rich Strike was not considered a threat. The former $30,000 maiden claimer, he finished a poor 6th in the Belmont, but showed up here anyway. The purse, or even a part of it, was certainly worth it. He wasn't completely ignored in the betting, going off at nearly 11-1, but pretty much was never a threat, finishing fourth and at least probably making enough to justify being there.  At this point, Rich Strike has only ever won two races, both at Churchill Downs. He's still eligible for non-winners of two other than.

As anyone who knows by now, Epicenter showed up BIG TIME and sealed the deal. Trained by Steve Asmussen and ridden by Joel Rosario for Winchell Thoroughbreds (the maroon silks with the W on the back), Epicenter made it look easy, going off at even money and making that look like a gift. The final time of 2:00.72 was more than decent. 

Of all the trainers represented in the Travers not one of them had won it. My exacta with Zandon, one of Chad Brown's three entrants, and Epicenter, who I had in the Derby, was my play of the day. 

As Epicenter made it clear in the stretch, the battle was for second I was trying with all my body English to get Zandon into the place spot. I lost track of the possible payout, but the result, either way, was going to make my day.

Blanket finish for second, but I had to believe even before the replay, that Cybereknife held on for second, and Zandon got close, but that only counts in horseshoes.

Zandon was close for second, finishing a nose behind Cyberknife. When someone loses a photo, someone wins a photo, but it wasn't me this time.

Undaunted, I took a quick look at the 11th race. Dinner wasn't ready yet, and there was time. The trainer David Donk has been doing very well at the meet, so far recording 5 wins from 33 starts. Donk is more than a capable trainer, and is always seen wearing a green Jets baseball cap. You've got to appreciate his optimism and loyalty there.

The #1 horse in the 11th, is a Donk entrant, Kressa, unraced, but with an absolute ton of good looking workouts showing, going all the way back to June 25. 

I interpret this as a sign that they finally found the right spot for the horse. Surely there have been 5½ turf Maiden Special Weight races during the meet the horse could have gone in, but this was the one it was in. Maybe the owners waited for Travers Day, I don't know.

The $5,000 Big Brown stud fee for the homebred out of Lady Kressa indicates a very family affair. Susan and Gerald Kresa own and bred the horse. I loved the nearly 12-1 odds. And John Velazquez riding added to the confidence, because as anyone who tunes in knows, Johnny just rode his 1,000th Saratoga winner the other day, a record held by no other jockey.

There are no world beaters in maiden races. As Charlie Brown from Peanuts once sighed, "there is no greater burden than a great potential." Or was it Lucy?

So, while Linda Rice's career maiden Feathers Road looks like a the horse to beat, can you trust a horse that is 0-11 not going 0-12 with your money on it?

But as is so often in these state bred Maiden Special Weights, the eligibility is open for 3 and 4-year-olds. Older horses, even at this stage of the calendar are considered to hold an advantage over their younger rivals.

Linda's horse is career maiden 4-year-old. Kressa is an unraced 3-year old. I don't care. Kressa still trumps a 0-11 maiden who's been losing consistently in races with 3 and 4 year-olds entered.

Typical turf finish. Blanket charge at the wire. Head, head and neck separate the top 4. Kressa? I lose another photo a head behind the career maiden, Linda Rice's Feathers Road, Linda's second winner on the card. Over the years, I've been on both sides of photo finishes. Winner and runner up. Today was the runner up version.

Taps. Day is done for me. Win or lose, there's always a good meal waiting.

For some reason, when I sign onto Twitter, I get a heaping helping of horse racing Tweets from people I do not follow (I follow almost no one). Usually they are informative, and I quickly scroll through them.

One the other day particularly stood out from being from someone in Texas who claims racing bona fides but who is an absolute jerk. I usually do not respond to Tweets, but I did this one. The Tweeter posted an image of the NYRA Saturday card at Saratoga, showing the full array of 13 races and all the betting possibilities. 

They then added the perplexing comment: 

you can't grow the sport with younger folks by having a 13 race card that spans over 7 hours

Is this guy for real?

Now the guy's from Texas, that is perhaps filled with horses, but that doesn't mean he knows much about horse racing, especially New York horse racing, and especially Saratoga racing.

My response was:

And your solution is..? Run all the races at once for a generation that has no attention span and doesn't read anything that 's not on their phone? True horseplayers like 13 races with accomplished horses and all the betting possibilities there are.

Younger people do go to the races. Each year at Saratoga I see them all. Maybe they're not handicapping very much, but they're eating, drinking and betting. This year's Travers saw a crowd of 49,672 souls crowd Saratoga. The handle, from all sources, was up over $3 million from last year, topping out at $55.6 million.

I saw two Tweets that were interesting. Daniel O'Rourke, CEO honcho at NYRA predicts fixed wagering on next year's Travers. Monmouth was going to experiment with that, and I don't know how it worked out.

What would be the odds? The morning line? Booking bets does not always mean the bookmaker comes out ahead. Perhaps over time you gain an edge, but one race can sink you with the right amounts spread over the entrants. And how do you figure the take? 

The candy store bookmakers in Queens I grew up with in the '50s and '60s would cap their payouts. No one got paid at greater than 20-1. Daily doubles, the only exotic bet of the era, was also capped. Rich Strike at 81-1 in the Derby would only payout at 20-1. Nevertheless, fixed odds wagering is intriguing.

Another Tweet mentioned that bettors might soon see over/under proposition wagering on say, will Rosario win more or less than 1.5 stake races on the card? How many exactas will the Ortiz brothers figure in? How many winners will Chad Brown score with?

That kind if wagering could interest me. But like anything else at the track, the results of photos will determine winners and losers.

Don't I know it.

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