Too Much of a Good Thing?

One thing I love is when a racetrack has a major stakes and they put on an all-star racing card full of stakes races.  North American Cup, Meadowlands Pace, Hambletonian Day, Super Sunday (this year at Pocono Downs) and the various Super Nights for state-bred horses are race cards which harness racing fans look forward to.

This Saturday is Adios Day at The Meadows and they have their version of what they think is an all-star card.  I cringe when I see this 18 race card.  It starts good  nice overnight races, the Adios, and two divisions of the Adioo Volo for 3yo pacers of each sex.  Then it goes down hill with eight races for two year olds including three divisions of the Arden Downs for 2yo filly pacers and five divisions of the Arden Downs for 2yo colt and gelding pacers.

 Eight races for two year olds.  The only thing which would make this worse is if the races were for 2yo trotters.  If there is a savings grace, I can turn off the simulcast after race 13 as the last five races are for 2yos.

To be fair, in the old days there used to be doubleheaders on Adios day so they could have split up these eight races over two race cards.  Unfortunately, with only one race card, they are forced to race all these races on Saturday afternoon (the last two racing days had other divisions of the Arden Downs).  Just the same, what could have been a great afternoon of racing becomes a so-so card.  Somehow, they need to change their scheduling even if the race some of these stakes over two days.

Well, the good thing is by shutting off the Meadows signal early, it gives me enough time to get read for the Hambletonian Oaks eliminations and other elimination races on the Meadowlands card.


Speaking of  the Meadowlands, horseplayers who bet the $100,000 guaranteed late Pick-4 on Hambletonian Day will b entitled to a  20% bonus on their winning Pick-4 tickets provided the tickets are purchased using TVG or 4NJBETS.

Random Musings As July Disappears

The Meadowlands Racetrack has established a Hambletonian mini-website.  You may check it out here.

VFTRG contributor Joe F. provides his random musings as another month comes to an end....

We’re in the early stages of a fierce public relations campaign the aim of which is to convince us that the Hambletonian is the greatest race on the planet. Unfortunately, the sophomore trotting brigade is, for the most part, an ordinary group. The Road To The Hambletonian is indeed a rocky one. 

Wheeling N Dealin looked like a budding star when he crushed the opposition in the BC in the fall, but his only two starts against a mixed bag of locals at Mohawk have been underwhelming. Some still speculate—quietly, more quietly with each passing week—that this is all part of Dustin Jones’ Machiavellian plan to have a fresh horse primed to tackle heats on race day. Hugh? He drew the nine in a Meadowlands open for Habletonion eligibles on Saturday. 

Royalty For Life may be the fastest of all but one doesn’t have to look too far back in his pedigree to find Noble Gesture, who was as crazy as he was fast, and he was very fast. Royalty For Life is this year’s MOMM…..Smilin Eli is a nice colt, but he’s at the center of a seedy backstretch soap opera, and besides he hasn’t raced since finishing out as the even money favorite from the nine in the Beal. That was on June 29. He’s in to go in that open at M1 Saturday night, with a new trainer and the same driver—TT…..Corky, another Muscles colt, won the Beal for Jimmy Takter. That’s the problem: Takter likes to drive him. Maybe he’ll drive Dontyouforgetit…..Spider Blue Chip, an Andover Hall colt, has really come on since the middle of June and Chuck Sylvester knows how to win this race…... Aperfectyankee is a possibility but he comes as a package deal with Oscarsson.

Check out the weak field vying for 450K in the Yonkers Trot. Yikes! By the way, Dewey’s offspring are seven months into their sophomore year. Do you see any hope at all for them? Sure they’ll make a little dough in the OSS, but he’s already moved on to New York. Are we being overly generous if we refer to Dewey as a regional stallion? His race record and introductory fee of 20K scream GC—afraid not. And what about Donato? Can you imagine any of his sons winning the Hambletonion, Colonial, Kentucky Futurity or BC? Take away Check Me Out and what do you have? He’s running as fast as he can in the PASS but occasional successes in that program won’t get it done. Maybe they can get a reduced rate if they send Dewey and Donato together on the same plane to Europe.

On the distaff side, many believe that Bee A Magician would beat the boys if she switched to the Hambletonion (the decision was made to race against the fillies). We were hearing similar talk about Check Me Out last year at this time, and the eliminations and final were separated by a week back then. Regardless, Bee stands above the rest in the Oaks; although the Broadway Hall filly, Frau Blucher, is no slouch. The latter is out of a Muscles Yankee mare. And Motown Muscle, who won the CDC final a couple of days ago, is Muscles’ granddaughter. Spider Blue Chip is out of a Muscles mare, and Corky and Smilin Eli are both by Muscles Yankee. Muscle Hill may have seven of the sixteen going in Saturday’s Peter Haughton eliminations, but he hasn’t forced the old man out to pasture yet.

You know this isn’t a memorable year for three-year-old filly trotters when To Dream On, Time To Kill, Fashion Athena and Royal Assets are a combined two for twenty-seven a week before the Oaks.

The same sort of reservations can be expressed with regard to the sophomore pacers where you have Captaintreacherous and I Luv The Nitelife on top of their respective divisions and the rest down below. That blah morning line for the Adios in conjunction with the lack of anticipation surrounding the race tells the tale. Toss the numbers in a jar, shake it up and choose one. Nitelife was not staked to the Adioo Volo; she goes in the Miss New Jersey Prep instead.

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Heston Blue Chip is five and one at Yonkers Raceway; it looks like Linda Toscano is going to abandon the TVG and head back to the four-year-old pacer’s more comfortable roots. He drew the deuce in Saturday’s open at Yonkers and will probably have Brennan sitting behind him. Dan Patch winner, Heston, and his O’Brien counterpart, Michael’s Power, are off to very slow starts. The four-year-old pacers have certainly made their mark on the FFA division, but no thanks to HBC and Michael’s Power. The latter is a gelding but the old saw about diminishing the value of a stallion by coming back at four is surely in play with HBC. Losing to the anonymous open bunch at Yonkers would take him down a notch or two. We heard a lot about how great he is last season. Any older pacer that aspires to greatness should be in the USPC eliminations this week. After all, Our Lucky Chip is in there with the big boys—again.

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After consecutive second place finishes, Maven is not entered in the second leg of the Ima Lula for four-year-old mares. CMO, Win Missy B, Real Babe, Personal Style and Maven should provide a real boost to the perennially pathetic older trotting mare division.

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The introduction of SBSW, in concert with Dragon Again, Western Terror and the rest had already transformed the PASS into an open stakes environment that was in a class of its own, but now with Western Ideal coming online, Bettor’s Delight on the horizon and the addition of Well Said and Art Official it’s going to get ridiculous…….Is this is the last year the Bettor’s Delight offspring are eligible to the NYSS? What a loss that will be. BD and Art Major do the heavy lifting in that program…….Shadow Play, the new star of the Ontario program, had his stud fee cut from 5K to four from 2012 to 2013, before any of his colts and fillies hit the track. The only pacing stallion to have his stud fee increased last year was SBSW. The conflation of a successful Shadow Play and the perpetually unsettled situation in Ontario will be fascinating to follow. I believe Blue Chip calls the shots on him. Does he stay or does he go? I f he stays what happens with that fee? Royal Mattjesty stands for that same 4K fee. Sportswriter is at five and Badlands Hanover is $5,500. Something has to give. They hustled Bettor’s Delight back across the border. Will they do the same with this son of The Panderosa? 

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Last year the USPC went to post with a twelve horse field, none of whom were four-year-olds. It was a much weaker contingent than the one that lines up for two eliminations on Saturday. Eleven of the nineteen entered on Saturday are four-year-olds—a 58% increase.

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Hattie is the latest broodmare to be granted automatic admission to the HOF based on outdated standards. A mare gets in if she’s produced a HOY plus one other 500K winner, or, produced a million dollar winner and two other 500K winners. Fred And Ginger is a few thousand from one million; Ginger And Fred is at 1.8 million; WWS is beyond 2.5 million; Silent Swing is close to two million; Casimir Camotion is at 1.7 million; the money standard is out of date.

Aside from Holborn Hanover, Hattie gave us Hyperion and Hillbilly Hanover. She also produced Haverford and Hatsoff. HOF?

What Could Have Avoided the 'Grand Beat'?

You may have read about the 'bad beat' at Louisiana Downs where a horseplayer thought they won a $488,000 Super Pick-5 pay-off when his horse crossed the finish line first in the last race.  After all, this is what the 'will pay' graphic showed.  Imagine his disappointment when he was paid only $11,983.  What happened?  The rules of the Super Pick-5 are that the jackpot is paid out only when one person has the winning combination.  If more than one person has the winning combination, half of the day's play gets paid out while the rest is added to the jackpost.  In the last race after the graphic was shown, there was a late scratch and sure enough, his horse became the post time favorite at the last minute; hence there were two winners.

The track did nothing wrong as the rules were followed, but it seems like it is another black eye for racing.  Let's face it when you get paid only a fraction of what you think you are going to get paid, you can't help but feel you are getting screwed.  When others read about the story, they are going to think racing is not a sport to wager on.

The fact is the horseplayer, now with options to gamble on, has become more sophisticated so the wager's rules need to be more sophisticated.  Merely not showing the 'will pays' as Louisiana Downs has done is not the answer.

A more common sense rule for these mega-jackpost wagers would be for the jackpot to be paid out when there is only one 'natural' ticket with the winning combination. Yes, the person who had the winning ticket on the basis of a late scratch would share in the jackpot, but at least in this case, the original horseplayer would have ended up with $244,000 instead of a relative pittance.

Instead of giving a gambler the post time favorite, why not offer a consolation payoff?  Yes, there could be multiple payoffs as a result of offering a consolation payoff, which would deduct from the jackpot but at least in the case of this wager, if you had thea scratched horse, you would collect if you had all the correct winners in the the other legs, yet maintain the original premise of the jackpot being paid out only if there is one winner of the bet.

Better yet, instead of assigning the post time favorite, why not make the horseplayer select a substitute runner who live if the original horse is scratched.    Otherwise, it would be possible for someone who had multiple runners in any of the legs to end up beating themselves by having to two combinations with the post time favorite due to a scratch, defeating themselves inadvertingly.

Any of these options would also prevent gamblers from manipulating the win pool by betting a horse with no chance to make sure a certain horse is not the post time favorite.  While the track benefits from this strategy, the rest of the gamblers are at a disadvantage.

The bottom line is you can't offer new style bets with old fangled wagering policies supporting them.

Oh Where Oh Where Has Exchange Wagering Gone?

Many a serious racing fan was excited by the prospect of Exchange Wagering making it to North American shores this year.  After all, California had approved exchange wagering as did the New Jersey legislature in authorizing the NJRC to adopt rules for Exchange wagering.  While thoroughbred horsemen have been looking at exchange wagering with a skeptical eye, horsemen at Cal Expo are anxiously awaiting its arrival and with New Jersey racing seemingly looking for anything which increases wagering on racing, it was a matter of time until it got approved.

Well, hold your horses it seems to be.  In New Jersey, whereas the Meadowlands would seem interested in exchange wagering, it seems the Meadowlands is not looking to be out in front in this endeavor and want to see how it is received at Cal-Expo where Monmouth Park fears the loss of traditional wagering handle which has a higher return to the tracks  though the benefit of exchange wagering is the lower commission is multiplied by volume, potentially returning more to the tracks than they would get in regular simulcast wagering.  This doesn't even consider the fact exchange wagering would likely be of interest to a younger untapped market.

So it seems it is California first.  In California, the CHRB submitted rules to the state's OAL and they rejected the rules.  After a meeting with CHRBR staff and OAL staff, the CHRB submitted a new set of rules to the state OAL which it awaits approval.  If approved, the earliest Exchange Wagering be approved would be in October.  Of course, the state's thoroughbred horsemen haven't given their approval to exchange wagering so at this time, it appears it would be limited to Cal-Expo.  Whether or not Cal-Expo would be a large enough 'test' for New Jersey interests remains to be seen but it appears the path for exchange wagering goes through Sacramento.


There are those who think those in horse racing do it just as a business and for sure there are those that think this way.  However, for a lot of stables, especially the smaller ones, it is a lifestyle as well and the horses are treated like family members.  So while there may be those who can just shake off a loss of an animal due to catastrophic injury or illness, there are those who consider the horse as part of the family.

Such is the story of Greg White who lost his filly Hay Beautiful in a freak accident on the way to the Meadowlands last weekend to race.   The horse had to be euthanized after breaking her back when one of the chains which held the trailer to the pickup snapped while driving down a highway causing the driver to lose control of the trailer.  We send our condolences to the connections of Hay Beautiful.


A field of fourteen have entered the Hambletonian Oaks requiring two elimination to be contested this weekend.  As for the boys, the Hambletonian will be raced in heats so it remains to see how many will be dropping into the box for the biggest event on the trotting calendar.    The eliminations will go as races two and  five.  Here are the fields for the eliminations including preliminary driving assignments.

2nd Trot - $35,000; Hambletonian Oaks - 3yo Fillies (1st Elimination)
1  Bee A Magician     Ron Pierce
2  Fashion Athena     John Campbell
3  Miss Steele            Andy Miller
4  Ma Chere Hall       Corey Callahan 
5  Frau Blucher         Jim Morrill Jr.
6  Hanover Belle        Mike Lachance
7  Deja Vu Too           Corey Callahan

5th Trot - $35,000; Hambletonian Oaks - 3yo Fillies (2nd Elimination)
1  Time To Kill                Simon Allard
2  Southwind Cocoa       Tim Tetrick
3  Raring To Go S           Pat Berry
4  To Dream On              Yannick Gingras
5  Coffeecake Hanover   Yannick Gingras
6  Mistery Woman           David Miller
7  Classic Martine            Ron Pierce


Do you Tweet?  Follow all the news about the Hambletonian Oaks and Hambletonian using the hashtag #Hambo13.

Ownership Responsibility Doesn't End When a Horse is Sold

Years ago the gelding Shiaway St. Pat, a winner of the first Hambletonian at the Meadowlands worked his way down the claiming ranks, ending up racing for a $2,000 claiming tag.  Fortunately for Shiaway St. Pat, the Meadowlands came to the rescue of the trotter and had the horse claimed and immediately retired him, realizing how wrong it was to have a Hambletonian winner racing in the bottom claiming ranks or even worse potentially breaking down. Shiaway became an attraction at the Meadowlands, taking up residence for quite a while in Paddock Park greeting visitors in the paddock on weekends before the infirmaties of age and the racing wars caught up with him and he had to be euthanized.

Like many horses, Shiaway St. Pat changed owners and they race them where they see fit; after all,  the fact the horse won the Hambletonian or another big race doesn't mean much to the new owners as they didn't profit from that victory in a big race,.  To them, the ledger resets at zero so when the earnings trickle in or dry up, they either drop the horse down to where they think it may win, or sell them to get rid of them.  Shiaway St. Pat was lucky, many other horses are not.

This is not unique to the standardbred world.  The Paulick Report tells the story of the horse Monzante, a winner of a Grade I race and others who won over $500,000 for his original owners.  Like Shiaway St. Pat, this horse was sold and then started the decline down the claiming ranks.  Unfortunately for Monzante, there was no guardian angel looking over him.  Monzante met his end this past Saturday at Evangeline Downs, breaking down in a $4,000 claiming race and was euthanized.

I am not suggesting champion horses can't be sold to new owners after winning a major/classic race.  There are legitimate reasons to sell a horse.  One is someone offers you an obscene amount of money for the horse you would be a fool not to sell, an owner may only race stakes horses and the horse may have aged into overnight events, the owner may need to raise funds.  There is no problem with selling a horse. 

However, the owner who won that million dollar race or made a large amount of money on a horse has a moral responsibility to keep an eye out looking for their old horse to make sure it doesn't come to situations like Shiaway St. Pat or Monzante did.  It shouldn't be left to luck nor should it come to a sitaution where a horse rescue calls the old owner to tell them the horse is at a kill auction and be asked to pay the bail on the horse.   I am not saying the original owner needs to take the horse back and pension it, but they should make sure the horse finds a good home when their racing career should be ended, be it buying or claiming the horse if the new owner doesn't do what's right for the horse. 

Ideally, any owner should keep an eye out for their old race horses but when an owner makes a life-changing amount thanks to a particular horse, this lack of concern is heinous and it puts another stake in the heart of horse racing.  A story like Monzante's should give pause to a lot of owners and wake them up to their moral responsibilities.