One of the best weekends in horse racing did not disappoint. Action-packed Friday and Saturday allowed us to see the top horses in the world come together and try to win their respective races. In order to provide accountability and transparency, I will be putting together recap articles after big race day events. I want to highlight the highs and try to dissect the lows. This is an important part of handicapping horses that is normally done behind closed doors, usually on the horses’ next starts. While I gave a cheat sheet for every race on Friday and Saturday, I will focus only on Saturdays Breeders Cup races. Friday was fun and we were able to cash about half our tickets due to the card being babies. Saturday’s BC races were Race 4 – 12.
The Good
Race 4 Covfefe was outstanding in Race 4. She was a top play for me and someone I suggested to single. Making back 2.5x value on your win bet, I bet heavily, and it paid dividends. The suggested exacta also hit with Bellafina (#6) coming second to beef up the exacta payout.
Race 5 While this could be also classified as a “bad” or “ugly”, the point stands that I was able to hold back and alerted everyone to skip this race. I will also say that my StableDuel long shot was good for 3rd in this race at 12/1.
Race 6 One of my best plays of the day came in this race where I liked Spun To Run to win. Spun To Run ended up going off at 9/1 and a $2 win bet returned $20.20. I loaded up on this horse with a huge win bet because I was feeling it. The exacta, as mentioned in my article also hit. $1 exacta paid $27.70.
Race 8 My top choice, Mitole, was able to come away with the win. Users in our discord channel get my live takes and up to date bets, angles and thoughts. I was all over Mitole instead of Shancelot. Strong $50 win bet. A return of $5.60 for every $2 bet to win. The box Exacta of Mitole and Shancelot also cashed, as told in my article.
Race 9 Uni at 7/2 was my top choice, as laid out in the cheat sheet. It was a nice $9.20 winner. Other horses I mentioned in the article completed the exacta. I would not have hit the trifecta with the 20/1 horse coming 3rd and a horse I like coming 4th.
Race 11 Bricks and Mortar was another top play for me, and he did not disappoint. He’s been perfect since 2017 and more than likely cemented Horse Of The Year. Exacta missed on this one, but the Win bet was where you should have been here.
Race 12Vino Rosso being my top choice and winning was monumental. I believe odds were 9/2 for this horse. My second choice finished second. This was a perfect exacta. While I was many beers down at this point into the night, the track was not allowing closers to close. This immediately dismissed Code of Honor and Yoshida from factoring. While I thought Yoshida had a shot in the morning when the article was posted, by 6 pm I was off of yoshida. Watching how the track plays is an important aspect of handicapping. It allows you to use fewer horses that don’t have a high probability of hitting the board. Thus, where I didn’t like 7 in the morning, I came around on him at night and elevated him into my play. We were able to cash big on Vino, the exacta, and even had one member in our discord that hit a $2 superfecta for $2500 on an $80 bet using Vino and Mckinzie for 1st and 2nd only! Incredible.
The Bad
Race 7 A huge swing and a miss on Sistercharlie. I took the loss of Sistercharlie’s rabbit, Thais, like no big deal when Sistercharlie needs that early speed to ween out the leaders. That scratch allowed a horse from overseas to win this race. While I did see one race where Sistercharlie didn’t have a rabbit, I will pay more attention to other horses moving forward if a rabbit scratch happens. Sistercharlie was good for 3rd place, so hopefully, your book had a promo for money back on 2nd or 3rd place finishers for win bets.
Race 10 This was easily my worst play of the day. I was so set on Midnight Bisou having a perfect season, I didn’t value any of the other horses to beat her. I suggested a win bet on her and to play her on top of exactas, trifectas, and supers. She didn’t take to the quicksand at Santa Anita like I thought she would and has never run this track. I had the winner and third-place finishers underneath Midnight Bisou. A simple box trifecta would have paid back $130 and I just was too sure of myself on this one. Unfortunate for us and for the horse.
The Ugly
Late Pick 5 While I don’t always give all of my plays, I do usually play pick sequences. The late pick 5 ended up paying $1,783 for a $0.50 bet. I played this and unfortunately got too cheap (on a day where I should not be cheap). Race 8, I singled Mitole. Race 9 I used a combo of 2, 6, 9 and 11. Race 10, I singled Midnight Bisou. Race 11, I singled Bricks and Mortar. Race 12, I used Vino and Mckinzie. If I had used the other horses I laid out in my article, I could have cashed. Instead, I had a $6 pick 5 ticket… Yes.. $6. If I spent up on that race and used the other horses, I would have spent $12 and made a profit of $1771. Yikes. Maybe next year.
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