Horseplayers

The 20th edition of the Grade 2, $250,000 Lexus Raven Run Stakes enticed 16 owners and trainers to enter one of the last graded stakes this year for 3-year-olds only. Leading the field in terms of accomplishments is 2017 Grade 1 Chandelier Stakes winner Moonshine Memories, who was last seen finishing third in the Grade […]

With only two weeks remaining until the 2018 Breeders’ Cup World Championships, chances to qualify into the $1 million* Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge (BCBC) are going fast, but a big weekend is at hand with four contests offering spots into the largest live-money handicapping contest in the world, highlighted by Saturday’s (Oct. 20) tournament which has a super-low qualifying ratio […]

So far in our series on speed figures, we’ve seen how numbers get adjusted using the Beyer method, how pace is incorporated into TimeformUS ratings and how so-called “designer” figure makers like Thoro-Graph and The Sheets take into account factors such as ground loss and wind speed. In our final installment, we’re looking at two […]

The Stronach 5, which has rewarded bettors its first three weeks with strong yields on investment, returns Friday with races from Santa Anita Park, Gulfstream West, Laurel Park and Golden Gate Fields. The wager, featuring a $50,000 guaranteed pool and an industry-low 12-percent takeout, begins with Gulfstream West’s seventh race, featuring 11 2-year-old fillies going […]

The New York Racing Association, Inc. (NYRA) and Monmouth at Far Hills will partner to offer horseplayers an all-stakes Pick 4 on Saturday, October 20. The Empire Showcase Day card from Belmont Park features eight stakes races for New York-bred horses including the featured $300,000 Empire Classic, a 1 1/8 miles dirt route for 3-year-olds […]

In the first two parts of our series on speed figures, we’ve seen two contrasting approaches for analyzing how fast racehorses run — Beyer Speed Figures and TimeformUS. Now for something completely different. By its own description, Thoro-Graph isn’t even a speed figure. It’s a performance figure. While the company uses some conventional speed figure […]

According to various sources, Parx Racing cancelled the card on Tuesday afternoon when the jockeys refused to ride. Apparently, a sauna in the jockey’s room-often called the “hot box”-was broken, and a number of riders were unable to make weight for their mounts. Jockeys often use options like a steam room sauna to reduce weight […]

Tommy Massis of Toronto is the king of Keeneland handicapping contests. On Sunday, he rode a $1,000 win bet on 19-1 shot Bella Noire in Keeneland’s fourth race to a win in the BCBC-NHC Challenge. His winning total of $20,800 bested second-place finisher Blake Jessee of Carmel, Indiana, by nearly $8,000. Massis, who also won the BCBC at […]

One thing that will be clear at the end of our series this week on speed figures is that no two numbers are the same. Each of the figure makers we’re exploring takes a different approach to rating race performance, and understanding the differences between them is critical to getting the best use out of […]

The creation of speed figures to handicap horse races dates back further than you might think. Horseplayer tomes published in the mid-1930’s suggested people were boiling down race performances to one number, teaching others how to do it and selling their ready-made figures. Today, a number of companies offer speed or performance figures to the […]