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Leaping lizards,
Larry, it's Leap Year! And, in keeping
with a tradition to inject extra fun into every opportunity it gets,
the Downs will give a $10 birthday gift to anyone born tomorrow, February
29. Show your I.D. anytime after
7 p.m. Friday and you'll receive your $10 bet! Also, this
is for everyone: the
$100 prize for tomorrow night's poker game is being doubled to $200. And the $25 show parlay prize is
being doubled to $50.
Every good reason to leap for joy and leap on down to the Downs on Leap Year Friday--even if you're just turning five! Hear that, Larry?
In other news: I'm in shock. Maybe you
will be, too. Given an easy way
to qualify for a finale in a horseplaying contest in the Bettor's Blog, 80 per cent
missed. What will help remedy
this poor showing? That
follows. Other highlights this
week:
• Deadline alert: Tomorrow is the deadline
to enter Triple Crown Challenge in which
you pick three 3-year-olds to make it to the Kentucky Derby
and beyond.
• New free game called Double Play has caught fire. Reg
continues to burn most
brightly
• Santa Anita plans to change its track surface--again. What do you think it will be?
• Mums the word for harness drivers. Talking can cost them $100.
• Saturday is Big 'Cap day at Santa Anita--another important Tour d' Champs day
at the Downs!
First, it was this quirky
news that had horseplayers overseas buzzing on the weekend:
AUSSIE BELLYFLOPS AT FINISH LINE: Celebrating
his stag with 26
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...and bellyflopping into third it's
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mates Saturday at Moruya
racetrack in Australia, a tipsy fan decided it would be fun to strip to
his underwear and race oncoming horses to the finish line. Jockeys
watched in astonishment as the man did a stumbling bellyflop at the
finish line. Only bettors
holding losing tickets could have been amused. The stewards promptly
declared the race no-contest because the leading horse was spooked by
the intruder and crashed into the inner rail, allowing other horses to
pass. A 31-year-old Canberra man was hauled away and charged with offensive conduct. There was no word on whether his
fiancee still wanted to marry him.
BRIT MAKES HISTORY WITH PERFECT
PICK-8: A British
horseplayer did something no one had done since betting shops were
legalized in England in 1961: He
multiplied a 50-pence ($1) bet into $1 million by predicting the
winners of a eight races being run in succession at various tracks
throughout England on the weekend.
It could not have come at a better time for Fred Craggs:
he was celebrating his 60th birthday.
News reports said he wasn't even aware of his good fortune when
he walked into a branch of the William Hill betting agency with his
ticket. "He turned pale
and muttered that he'd better go home and tell his wife."
A SHOCKER
16 of 20 fail to qualify; remedy set for Saturday
Imagine this: To retain
ownership of your car, you must bet $6 ($2 win/place/show) on a horse
of your choice and get a return at least equal to your $6 investment. Otherwise, you'd lose your car. By this standard, 16 of 20
semi-finalists in a Bettor's
Blog contest Saturday would have lost their car. Eighty
per cent. The car analogy, of course, just dramatizes what was at stake
but having so few players make the cut does demonstrate a need for a
fresh look at horseplaying basics and that's going to be my aim this
Saturday. (By the way, Roger
Jones won the contest the next day with a $3.40 Arabian horse at
Sam Houston and gets $50. The
second-place finisher had War Pass, a $2.10 horse at
Gulfstream. Enough said on
that. The contest started with
90 entrants.) Want a way to get
past that spotty showing?
(1) I'm holding
a horseplayer seminar this Saturday at 11 a.m. in the Finish Line.
We'll analyze actual live races
running at the time and play them as a group. Bring your questions!
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These titles, among others,
available Saturday
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(2) NEW! The best
race-playing books on the market will be offered for sale at the
seminar. The Downs just made a large purchase from the Daily Racing Form. Interesting, valuable reading.
(3) I will show
you a race from last Saturday that blogger semi-finalists could have
played because it virtually "popped" off the page. That horse paid $20 to win and $9 to
place. After Saturday, never
again will you miss this kind of horse!
(4) I will show
you how to find the very best bet
anyone can make at the races.
(5) I'll help
you analyze three HOT PLAYS for the afternoon. If you had bet $2 win/place on my
three previous HOT PLAYS, you would have collected $29.
(6) Read, or
re-read, "secrets to playing the races" posted here on the Downs website.
(7) Make
arrangements for a ride home in the event you fail to heed the advice
at the seminar and lose your car anyway. Okay, not funny.
So ....see you Saturday at 11 a.m. in the Finish Line! Everyone's welcome! Let's get a turnaround happening in
time for spring!
SANTA ANITA TO CHANGE SURFACE YET AGAIN
My prediction: dirt.
What's yours?
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A billboard Santa never wants to
post again
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A day-long forum on
synthetic track surfaces last week at Santa Anita produced more fog
than clarity. Half the trainers
said it produced more injuries, others said it reduced injuries, veterinarians said it produced different
kinds of injuries. Jockeys
agreed that riding over synthetics was more comfortable but leading Cal jockey Garrett Gomez said the surface was
unpredictable from day to day.
Others at the forum said synthetics deserved a "wait and
watch" approach. The representative from the company that caused
all of Santa's problems, Cushion Track, didn't even show up. In the
face of all this, beleaguered Santa Anita president Ron Charles
has announced he is going to totally replace the current
Cushion/Pro-Ride mixture after the current meet ends in mid-April. What is he going to do, knowing that
his track will be hosting the next two years of Breeders' Cups, one
this fall and one in 2009? I
think he has no choice but to install dirt--that's the only surface
everyone is familiar with. Downs announcer Darren Dunn says I'm dead wrong--that it will be Polytrack (in
use at Woodbine, Turfway, Keeneland and Del Mar) or Tapeta (in use at Golden Gate Fields and
Presque Isle Downs). But can they afford to flirt with yet another
surface that may have unknown consequences only weeks before the
Breeders' Cup? What do you
think Santa will do? What do you
want Santa to do? Email your
opinions to theinsider@assiniboiadowns.com
HOLD YOUR TONGUE!
The harness police are watching
It's hard to imagine anyone
more closely scrutinized than harness drivers. Drivers are routinely fined $50 for
talking anywhere on the track, $100 for talking to another driver
during a post parade, $50 for not keeping the proper course, $50 for
not holding the reins with both hands through the length of the
stretch, $50 for not keeping both feet in the stirrups, $100 for
overusing the whip, $100 for
using naughty language, $100 for striking wheels, $100 for "causing
trailing horses to become confused" by taking your horse to the
lead and taking up, $200 for kicking your horse, $200 for whipping
below the belt (uh, below the poles), $200 for impeding another horse,
$300 for blocking the passing lane and $1,000 for being a hothead
around the paddock judge. The penalty for not trying hard? Priceless abuse from the fans.
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Jockey Irwin Driedger, agent Lorne
Spearman in 1978
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Liz's Pride, Irwin Driedger at the
reins, holds off
Toronto invader in 1978 Winnipeg Futurity
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"MY MOST MEMORABLE MOMENT"
Almost fell out of the grandstand
When you're in your 20's and
have racetrack blood coursing through your veins because your
grandfather has been bringing you to the track since you were
seven--and you have a great gift of gab--what do you do with your
life? For Lorne Spearman
in 1976 (and now a jockey's agent at Woodbine for Corey Fraser),
the answer was easy: become a
jockey's agent. But that involvement
with racing almost cost him a spill from the third-floor grandstand
during the running of the Winnipeg Futurity in August, 1978 as he
watched his jockey, Irwin Driedger, aboard Manitoba-bred Liz's
Pride hold off a closing rush from the favoured Medaille d'Or,
a Secretariat-bred invader from Toronto. "I
nearly jumped over the rail. My
brother (Wayne) caught me," Spearman recalls in his most
memorable moment. "Jean
Louis Levesque, the powerhouse owner of the second-place horse, had
expected to win the race."
Some 6,000 people packing the grandstand and tarmac witnessed this
proud moment in Manitoba racing and the win launched Lorne and Irwin into
the racing stratosphere. Irwin
became four-time leading jockey at Assiniboia before he and Lorne
headed to the big-time in Toronto where they both continued to excel. The jockey later became president of
the Jockey's Guild of Canada and today oversees maintenance on
Woodbine's Polytrack. At Woodbine last year, Lorne's current jockey,
Corey Fraser, won 42 races worth $2.4 million in purse money.
DOUBLE PLAY EMERGES AS POPULAR GAME
Reg gets hat-trick amid chants:"Who can edge out
Reg?"
Saturday night has emerged
as "big event" night in the Clubhouse with the advent three
weeks ago of an exciting new free game called Double Play. "People
have been telling me how much they enjoy it," said promo gal Chelsea
Obsniuk. "It's constant action." In it, a player predicts a show horse
and the total of the top three finishers in six races, three
thoroughbred races alternating with three harness races starting at 7:30 p.m. The big news
last Saturday was Reg Pluchinske getting his hat trick--three
consecutive Saturdays of winning at the game. "Reg has been on fire!" said Chelsea. This past Saturday he won $45 which, added to
winnings in two previous weeks, gives him $195 in winnings. It's as if he can count on Double
Play each Saturday night to supplement his betting bankroll. "Who can edge out Reg?" became the
battle cry of those trying to unseat him. Other winners of the 21
entrants that night: Ken Porter and Terry Pagee picked up
$50 in betting vouchers each; Art Solvason and Glen Sirkis
$25 each. Carryover to Saturday: $25, bringing total prize up to
$200. Remember, it's free to
enter. And you can enter one to
six races, your choice. More.
WHO ELSE WON? "Augment" augments Drabing's bankroll
Death by Bay Meadows: Mark Drabing was the only
person left standing among 23 competitors when Augment won the
fifth race at Bay Meadows Saturday, giving him the $100 in betting
vouchers. The game, which
requires entrants to predict winners at the Bay starting in race 2,
continues every Saturday afternoon.
Friday poker: Retiree Dennis Lee got good
cards dealt to him all night, giving him $100 as the ultimate winner among
10 in the free Friday night game.
He and Rod Zaretsky win a seat in the $1,000 poker finale
March 28. Remember, to celebrate
Leap Year Friday, $200 is the prize in tomorrow's poker game. Show
parlay challenge: Bill
Bartlett increased his $10 to $38 in three races Friday night and
won $25 in betting vouchers for doing so. For Leap Year tomorrow, you
can win $50.
DID YOU KNOW that Santa Anita has cancelled more races this year
than it has cancelled in all of its previous 70 years combined? Cushion Track flooding forced 11 days
of cancellations, three more than the eight days throughout its history
racing on dirt.
TIP O' THE WEEK: Treat racing like the stock market
People who play
the stock market successfully don't buy 10 shares of this, five shares
of that, eight shares of that, etc.
They do a bit of investigating, then
invest in a large chunk of shares in certain segments of the
market. They might read an
annual report, size up news reports, perhaps consult with a
broker. Successful wagering is
similar: watching replays,
examining trainer stats in the DRF, noting track biases and workouts or
equipment changes, then pouncing on select horses or races when you can
back up your bet with strong arguments.
HEARTY ITALIAN
DISHES grace tonight's
all-you-can-eat buffet in the
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Italian meatballs
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Chocolate biscotti
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Terrace Dining
Room from 5 to 8 p.m.
Feast on Italian wedding soup, Italian meatballs in tomato
sauce, chicken parmesan, jardiniere alfredo, ratatouille, grilled
marinated vegetable salad, chocolate biscotti and so much more for only $14.95. Next Thursday's theme: Ukrainian. Upcoming: Book now for Easter Sunday Brunch, March 23. Menu.
Phone 885-3330.
HOT WEEKEND ACTION: It's Big 'Cap Saturday at Santa
One of the
biggest days in Santa Anita's winter/spring meet, the $1 million Santa
Anita Handicap, runs this Saturday. Be sure to bring your Tour d' Champs
card (or get one if you don't have one). Present it at the Race Book kiosk in the Clubhouse
for another chance to win a trip to the Breeders' Cup. That will also enter you into three
draws for popular, classy Santa Anita merchandise (fleece pullover and
vintage cap).
At a glance:
Friday features free poker and is your last chance to enter
Triple Crown Challenge. Saturday starts with 11 a.m. horseplayer seminar. From noon to 4 p.m., get your Tour d' Champs card
stamped. Play Death by Bay
Meadows for $100. Saturday
evening: Play Double Play
for $250 starting 7:30 p.m.
Free Double Play program.
NEXT INSIDER:
Digging up the
hatchet to clash again with--guess who?
Oh-oh.
Don't forget the seminar Saturday 11 a.m.!
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