refresh |  $100,000Grade 3 Hollywood Prevue stakes wps - exacta - trifecta | past performances  |
Saturday November 21th - 4:05 pm PT | 7 furlongs - CushionTrack | OFFICIAL RULES |  |
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Grade 2 Hollywood Prevue - contest
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Scenes from Queens: pilgrimage to The Big A + DRF Handicapping Qualifier
It is autumn in New York and that means the traditional switchover of racing from Belmont Park to the venerable Aqueduct Racetrack. The Thanksgiving season also means it is time for my annual pilgrimage to the track affectionately known as The Big A. Caught between my Saturday simulcasting ritual and some inclement weather I decided on attending the New York Stallion Stakes card on Sunday, November 15th. As Simon and Garfunkel once sang in the classic tune Mrs. Robinson it sure beat "sitting on a sofa on a Sunday afternoon".As I arrived before noon on Rockaway Boulevard the flea market crowd had gathered inside the parking lot just outside the far turn. This crowd consisted many of the same vendors and ethnic customers that were here for my pilgrimage last year. Some things haven't changed I thought. And sure enough it hadn't. The north side entrance to the Grandstand is still shuttered and the turnstiles bolted. The paint has peeled off another layer and the concrete slabs are beginning to crumble with the help of every dripping drop of water that falls from the huge overhang that covers the enormous grandstand. Yes another year has passed with no imminent signs of capital improvements to the facility that was good enough to host a Breeders Cup event back in 1985. It made me wonder how does such grandiose podunk-ness set into a historic major league racing facility located in the greatest city in the world?
 | Look around you. All you see Are sympathetic eyes. Stroll around the grounds Until you feel at home. ~ New Yorkers Simon and Garfunkel in their classic tune 'Mrs. Robinson' | |
While Aqueduct is the least appreciated of the three major New York racetracks this is still a racing facility that handled $5.9 million in all-sources handle on Wednesday and $6.1 million in all sources handle this past Sunday. This is not some obscure racetrack out in Idaho. This is big time racing featuring bloodstock which may cost upwards of $100,000 at the sales. Every racing program features multi-millionaire owners playing the game with many successful-if-not-famous horsemen of the American training ranks.
Every respecting homeowner does the annual spring cleaning and renovation projects to keep the property values up and the place inviting to family and guests. This is clearly not the case here. For several years now the entire grandstand portion has been shuttered and ghosts of past racing memories now reside through the length of the stretch. The entire grandstand is now used for storage or for nothing at all. Many grandstand doors have shattered glass and dripping water that contributes to a potential safety problem. As a result fans are now funneled into the remaining decent areas of the facility, The Clubhouse. But even there I found a group of pigeons seeking food and shelter inside the Manhattan Terrace section. What is truly saddening is that those who live and work in the Aqueduct area have come to accept it as "home". New York racing deserves better. The fans and employees deserve better. The sooner this historic racetrack is restored to decency American Racing will be much better off.
After lunching on a stromboli from the palatable fare at the Sbarro's stand, Sunday afternoon featured glimpses of autumn sun to mingle with the balmy-for-November 60 degree weather. And many fans did take advantage of the warmth by gathering on the apron outside "the pit",
the amphitheatre-like saddling area that removes the much of the intimacy for the live patrons. The racing card featured a series of races from the New York Stallion Series program. The New York horseplayers had a bead on the local stock as none of the winners paid more than 3/1 odds. One of them was Ruffino (pictured at the top of page) took the Cormorant division for H. James Bond as a Main Track Only entry. And that is something Mr. Bond plans very well for.
thumbnails below:
The Big A train station. The Empire State Building is in the skyline. The "A" train stops here (of course).
The current state of the historic but now shuttered grandstand.
Taking place on the same afternoon in the upscale (for Aqueduct) Equestris Room was one of the final qualifiers for the Daily Racing Form - NTRA Handicapping Championship. The field featured many of the usual suspects found on the NHC tour. Gathered among the bag-toting, laptop carrying, sheets users were superstar handicappers like Labriola, Gutfreund, Rippey, Conte, Matties, Bavlish. There were 228 entries in this edition but a several handicappers submitted two entries or had a family member on the leader board as proponents of the credo "the family that plays together stays together". Thirty eight entries or 17% of the entries came out ahead on their allotted $440 mythical dollars for the weekend. The two day event called for nine $20 win, place or show wagers and one $40 wager on both days at Aqueduct, Calder, Churchill Downs. The maximum number of wagers for the weekend totaled twenty. I very much approved of this format as it calls upon the handicapper to show selectivity skills which is an important and neglected facet of wagering profitably on horse racing.
The winner was a Floridian by the name of Robert Gianquitti who topped both days of action on the leaderboard. The top three players which included contest veterans Mike Labriola and Diane McClyment also qualified for the Handicapping Finals at The Red Rocks Casino Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 29-30, 2010. This event will feature total purse money of a $1 million and the champ will be honored as the DRF-NTRA Handicapper of the Year at the 2010 Eclipse Awards. Earlier this autumn I had posted about the DRF qualifier held at the Meadowlands. That edition also featured out of town invaders getting plane tickets to Vegas. The locals must get back to the basics. ;-)
The Top Twenty on the leaderboard:
Please click thumbnails to enlarge photos. More images may be viewed at my Flickr photostream
While in The Equestris Room I also had a chance encounter with the legendary rider and 1990 Hall of Fame inductee, Jorge Velasquez. As a winner of 6,795 races in his career senor Velasquez is best known for being the rider of the great Alydar. As an old-timer I still remember yelling at the television yelling "come on Jorgee!" during the Thoroughbred Action replays. "Jorgee" was his nickname as deemed by the former NYRA announcer Frank Dwyer. Velasquez along with his sidekick Angel Cordero jr. often battled tooth-and-nail for jockey supremacy at many an Aqueduct meets. It was great to see him still frequenting the joint.Please click thumbnails to enlarge photos. More images may be viewed at my Flickr photostream.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
