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Honoured for last year's top horses
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Funny Cide owner Jack Knowlton (left) last Saturday
presented Assiniboia Downs 2007 Horse of the Year awards to Frank
Johnson & Dr. Betty Hughes for best Manitoba-bred, Eight by Ten,
and to Gary Danelson for best overall horse, Car Keys. More. (Photos courtesy of Gerry Hart)
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Two words have the racing world
buzzing: Big Brown.
Yes, a colt called Big
Brown took the racing world by storm last Saturday, blasting through
sizzling fractions in the $1 million Florida Derby, posting a faster time
than Barbaro did before he won the
Kentucky Derby in 2006. He
decidedly is the new horse to watch in the run-up to the Kentucky Derby
which goes to post four weeks from this Saturday--and a new horse you can
future-wager on today through Sunday.
More on that below.
In other news: FOOLED YA! (And myself,
too!) in last week's April Fool column. If you want to take one more peak at
last week's column to try to spot pranks I was playing on you, click here. The Great
Reveal follows below. I hope some
of you don't find it embarrassing when I point out one glaring "joke"
in last week's column that you may have missed. Also:
• Derby madness continues this Saturday, a Tour d' Champs day, with the
Santa
Anita Derby, Illinois Derby and the Wood Memorial from New York.
• Car Keys and Eight by Ten were named Horses of the Year
at Downs awards
banquet last Saturday.
Full awards list here.
• Did you see and capitalize on a horseplaying
"secret" I shared with you in previous
columns? It paid big.
See Tip o' the Week below.
• Win a berth in the World Series of Poker! Take your first step at the Downs this
Friday!
KENTUCKY DERBY COUNTDOWN
Big Brown was faster than Barbaro;
will War Pass bounce back?
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Will War Pass
bounch back to
his winning form at Aqueduct
on Saturday?
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Suddenly, everyone's talking
about Big Brown, the colt who destroyed the field in the $1
million Florida Derby last Saturday, doing it with fast early fractions
and a final time that was one second faster than Barbaro in 2006, when Barbaro went on
to win the Kentucky Derby. Big Brown
will likely take over from come-from-behind specialist Pyro as the favourite in the final Kentucky
Derby futures wager which is currently available for you to bet (until
Sunday at 6 p.m.) Before this win,
Big Brown wasn't even listed as a separate entry in the futures pool; he
was part of the "field."
A horse to watch, too, is Peruvian star 3-year-old Tomcito, who made a strong closing rush (like Pyro?) to finish third in the Florida Derby. He was
purchased for only $7,500 in a sale at Keeneland. A friend in the Cayman Islands touted that
horse to me for the Florida Derby and he certainly looks like Kentucky
Derby material if he earns enough to qualify for the big one. Derby madness continues this Saturday with these races and with this
huge question: Will the
highly-vaunted War Pass bounce back in the Wood Memorial at Aqueduct?
• $750,000 Wood
Memorial (Aqueduct)--War Pass returns! (After finishing last
in the Tampa Bay Derby two weeks ago, when he was the prohibitive
favourite.)
• $500,000 Illinois Derby (Hawthorne)--undefeated in his three races, Denis of Cork
will likely be favoured in a
short field of seven
• $1 million Santa
Anita Derby--Colonel John will be
the horse to beat
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Joke's on me!
Jack Knowlton is man in the middle,
NOT the person kissing the cup
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Secretariat
on Time, postage stamp
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WRONG Funny
Cide
wins the Derby
CORRECT Secretariat
wins Belmont
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THE GREAT REVEAL
Two April Fool pranks were intended, one was not
Some of you were sharp; one of
you (Stewart Hayek) was very, very sharp. In response to my planting April Fool's
pranks in the last column, some of you pointed out one obvious joke, a reference I made to
a track called Upside Downs in Utah which, of course, doesn't
exist. And the state of Utah, with a large Mormon religious population, doesn't even have a
track. Ha, ha. The next prank was less apparent: The
picture purportedly showing Funny Cide
winning the Kentucky Derby in 2003 actually is a
picture of one of the most famous race horses of all time, Secretariat,
winning the Belmont Stakes by 31 lengths in 1973. Why is this picture so obviously that
of Secretariat, you ask? The
distinctive checkerboard blinkers, the trademark pattern of Secretariat's
owner, Helen "Penny" Chenery. Secretariat's head--with those
distinctive blinkers--appeared on the cover of Time, Newsweek and Sports
Illustrated and on a U.S. postage stamp. Congrats to
those among you who weren't fooled by that "Funny Cide" caption.
The third "joke" was
unintended: The picture of the guy
kissing the Kentucky Derby trophy SHOULD have been Funny Cide owner Jack Knowlton (who spoke at the
track last Saturday), but it wasn't because of my oversight when proofing
this column. (Jack Knowlton was actually to the left of the cup-kisser as
you'll see in the full picture shown above.) Insider reader Stewart Hayek
pointed out the error. So, good on you Stewart, for your keen
eyesight--and for turning the joke on me!
Don't we all love April Fool's day? And, oh yes, one of you pointed out
that I misspelled Elysium Fields, a horse entered in the Florida
Derby.
I hope y'all had a chance to
play a couple jokes on friends and acquaintances yourself. The funniest one I can recall was
disguising my voice and phoning Downs GM Sharon Gulyas
and telling her I was from the Winnipeg Humane Society, checking out
reports that the Downs was illegally harbouring a restricted
animal--a zebra--in its stables.
She told me, in her usual professional way, that she didn't think
so but would have security personnel check the stables for any sign of a
zebra.
SLUGFEST
Bigg finally hits; Stretch still ahead
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Stretch vs Bigg
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Anyone who has watched my plays
in my 20-day slugfest with Stretch must know some of the frustration I've
felt with the trips my horses have been getting. Three horses with proven
front-end ability for some reason didn't get the lead, one horse was
checked and, then, last Saturday I started to feel really snake-bitten
when a Mountaineer horse that even Stretch acknowledged was a good pick
at 6-1 acted up in the starting gate and was eased by the jockey shortly
after leaving the starting gate.
But, finally, my fortunes turned on Tuesday when I hit with a 7-1
blinkers-off horse at Turf Paradise, collecting $176 for a $20 win bet
and putting my bankroll about $120 shy of Stretch who has been playing
mainly odds-on favourites. As of writing, Stretch has seven plays. I have six. It should be an interesting
finish. You can watch the action
on Stretch's Bettor's Blog, although the timing of his posts is erratic because he is
participating in a handicapping contest in Las Vegas.
POKER ENDS--AND BEGINS EVEN BIGGER!
Play Fridays for cash and a seat in World Series
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Poker
winners:
Front: Wayne Misko, Shawn Gorrie.
Back: Murray Chaban, Glen Miller
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Winter poker came
to a friendly ending in the grand finale last Friday when the four
players still standing agreed to "chop" the $1,000 cash
prize. They agreed to split $800
among the four of them and only play out the remaining $200, with
Wayne Misko emerging the biggest winner, getting $400. Receiving $200 each were Shawn Gorrie, Murray Chaban and Glen Miller. But the winter tournament was only a
warm-up to the REALLY BIG ONE: the games
that will result in someone going to Las Vegas to play in the World Series of Poker next year. The regular qualifying rounds take
place Fridays and Saturdays during live racing. But players can get a jump on the live
season by pre-qualifying tomorrow and each Friday leading up to live
racing. The top two winners each
week will win seats in the September 19th finale AND THERE ARE NOW WEEKLY CASH PRIZES FOR THE TOP THREE: $100, $50 and $25. To get a seat Friday, play free show
parlay challenge on races 3 to 5 at Sam Houston or enter your name in a
draw.
Other winners: Death by Stampede: Myrna Dram outlasted 26 entrants
in the regular Saturday afternoon game and won $100 in betting vouchers
on race 4. Santa Anita merchandise winners: Grant Buckoski, Donny
Allard and Anne Champion. Double Play: Biggest
winners among 13 entrants Saturday night were Bob Pirson
and Marcel Fath who split $125 for
correctly predicting a show horse and the total of the top three
finishers in race 5 at Sam Houston.
The previous Double Play king, Reg
Pluchinske, collected $25 for predicting
all six show horses, three at Sam Houston, three
at Meadowlands. The free game
continues with $175 this Saturday starting at 7:30 p.m.
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50th ANNIVERSARY NOSTALGIA
What was playing on the radio, the year
Assiniboia Downs was born?
Witch Doctor
David Seville
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TIP O' THE WEEK: A secret that
works
No handicapper
anywhere in the world has ever mentioned this as far as I know. It is purely a local secret discovered
by Stretch and it WORKS. I've said
it here before and I'll say it again:
horses with two identical workouts among their last three workouts
are contenders, regardless of odds.
Go to the bank if you see three identical works.
Need proof? See the program
page from last Saturday's seventh race at Bay Meadows here. Which horse
has three identical workouts? It
paid $28 to win and contributed to "easy" pick-3s and a pick-4
that paid in the hundreds.
Obviously, I had it and hope a few of you had it, too, if you
remembered reading about it here.
(The horse is #11 Rockin Roman
in case you can't figure it out.)
DELICIOUS DINING
TONITE: German cuisine
featured
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Pork
schnitzel
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Pork schnitzel,
bratwurst with onions, braised chicken thighs with sauerkraut are just
the beginning of hearty germanic dishes at
tonight's all-you-can-eat buffet in the Terrace Dining Room from 5 to 8
p.m. for only $14.95. Big dessert
assortment and salad bar. Start out with the Downs' famous beer and cheese soup. Menu. Next week's theme: Mexican. Phone
885-3330 to reserve.
UPCOMING EVENTS: Woodbine opens Saturday
Remember how to get
an edge playing Woodbine's ever-changing Polytrack? Go to Woodbine's website: www.woodbineentertainment.com and scroll down on
the left and click on the icon that shows you what the track crew has
done to it. Light harrowing means
front-runners can win; deep harrowing (5-inch) favours
closers. Three-inch harrowing
means either can win. At least,
that's the information the track provided last year. I haven't seen anything yet.
Keeneland meet opens tomorrow
(Friday): The track with the slow-go Poly
goes to post at 12:15 p.m. Wednesdays to Sundays.
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