Today's Best BetsIt's halftime -- bring out the band! Below are the results for the first three weeks of the meet. Clearly it's been a tough meet so far for the public prognosticators -- no one has topped the 30% mark for winners-on-top.
Leading the way is Mark Cusano of the Daily Gazette, and our colleague on Capital OTB-TV. But there is a solid pack of pursuers within four or five wins of the top of the heap.
Just to give you an idea of how tough the meet has been so far -- compare Cusano's total in 2006 [48-163], to his similar top-of-the-list position at this point last year [67-171]. You can view the entire 2005 and 2004 mid-season scorecards for a more complete comparison. And keep in mind that we're still making up races that were lost when the entire racing card was canceled due to heat earlier in the meet.
As for our own numbers -- Best Bets sits a comfortable four winners from the top. In 2005 we grabbed 57 winners on top during the last three weeks of the meet and in 2004 we selected 65 winners during the final eighteen racing days. So we're looking forward to big things. Stay tuned...
Note: Discrepancies in total number of races played is due to some handicappers losing races due to scratches or adding races with simulcast plays.
|
Mark Cusano Daily [Schenectady] Gazette |
48-163 |
|
Matt Graves Albany Times Union |
47-163 |
|
Jerry Bossert NY Daily News |
46-161 |
|
Tom Cunningham Albany Times Union |
46-163 |
|
Dave Litfin Daily Racing Form |
46-158 |
|
Mike Lipack NY Daily News |
45-163 |
|
Bill Heller Daily [Schenectady] Gazette |
44-163 |
|
Dave Little NY Daily News |
44-162 |
|
Seth Merrow Best Bets - equidaily.com |
44-163 |
|
Kyle Brownell Post-Star [Glens Fall, NY] |
43-163 |
|
Russ Harris NY Daily News |
43-163 |
|
John DaSilva NY Post |
42-163 |
|
Tim Wilkin Albany times Union |
42-163 |
|
Bill Taylor Saratogian |
41-162 |
|
Mark Hoffman The [Amsterdam, NY] Recorder |
40-165 |
|
Eric DeGrechie Saratogian |
38-161 |
|
Sherry Ross NY Daily News |
38-163 |
|
Tom Cavanagh NY Daily News |
37-163 |
|
Mike Jarboe Albany Times Union |
37-163 |
|
Affrunti NY Post |
36-163 |
|
Tom Law Saratogian |
36-161 |
|
Vic C NY Post |
35-162 |
|
Nick Kling Troy Record/Saratogian |
35-163 |
|
Bev Swimm Albany Times Union |
35-163 |
|
Debbie L NY Post |
34-163 |
|
Ed Fountaine NY Post |
29-163 |
1-10. We started Week Three off with some momentum -- but weakened over the last couple of days. Only one winner on top on Monday [2nd, $5.30]. But the handicapping overall was still decent. Our top three boxed for a couple of tri's [2nd, $49.40/$2; 5th, $127.00]. And dipping four deep picked up another two tri's, capped by the $596.00/$2 gimmick in the 4th. So there was a little bit of action in and among the selections to close out the first half of the meet.
Every season it seems like there are one or two races we'd like back -- give us another chance to make our picks. This year's prize winner in that category is likely to be Monday's 3rd. We picked Mr Antagonizer on top in this conditional claimer but we noted in our comments that "the drop in for a tag is not a move that inspires confidence from this trainer [his stock isn't typically meant for claiming ranks]." Our second choice in the race was Interline, and we wrote, "Looks logical on the numbers." You know the rest of the story -- Mr Antagonizer fades to last while Interline revs up in the lane to win at 7-2. We saw it coming and still stepped in front of the bus. Live and learn. We hope...
On-track it was another beautiful day with comfortable temps and plenty of sun. A crowd of 17,734 took advantage.
Monday night the jockeys squared off against the NYS Police in their annual charity softball game at the East Side Rec field. The last couple of years the game has come down to the wire but this year the cops jumped out to a commanding lead that the jocks just couldn't overcome. The riders rallied in the 9th to close the gap from 14-4, but went down swinging, 14-9.
There was a raffle to choose one lucky fan to play with the jockeys and the winner was none other than NY Post handicapper John DaSilva. He eventually scored the first run for the jocks when he tagged from second on a fly ball and then stretched it around third to make it home standing up. Jerry Bailey was on hand to throw out the first pitch and the jocks team also included John Velazquez, Garret Gomez, Mike Luzzi, Channing Hill, Javier Castellano and others. And the competitive juices are still flowing for Angel Cordero who was obviously miffed by his team's play on a few occasions. There was a full house in the bleachers including trainer Rich Schosberg, Jim Jerkens and Leah Gyarmati, jockey Diane Nelson, and DRF's Dave Grenig.
No racing. Dark day.
FIRST RACE
SECOND RACE
THIRD RACE
FOURTH RACE
FIFTH RACE
SIXTH RACE
SEVENTH RACE
EIGHTH RACE
NINTH RACE
Best Bets Homepage Today's picks The Challenge Calendar Track Info Weather 
| Note: Pages on this site are labelled with the equidaily.com logo. Some links are for information only and lead to pages at other sites. equidaily.com is responsible only for the pages on this site. equidaily.com assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions. Always check with official sources to verify info. |
