Yee Haw, it’s a pool party y’all! (Jacob…K)

Today’s third installment of the HANA Pool Party takes place in the 3rd at Mountaineer in the exacta pool. As usual there are free PPs and other items over HANA and this week local Mountaineer handicapper Mark Patterson offers his take.

I love the exacta, not only is it my favorite wager, it’s also my most successful wager (pretty sure I just jinxed myself!). I’ve been home with a nasty cold the past few days but I managed to look over the race yesterday.

The race is pretty evenly matched and while the favorite, Enter the Lion, did stand out a bit, most notably for winning on the cut back, I’m more than likely going to throw him out. Looking back over the charts for the last days uncovered that front runners and stalkers have done overwhelmingly better than off the pace types. The two races where Enter the Lion has won have been won from the off the pace and while he ran his last two on the pace (as if they were sprints) my guess is that he’ll be back off the pace when in sprinting company.

Currently I’m interested in 5, 6, 7 & 8 and am going to wait until I get to eyeball them in the parade to figure out how I’m going to play it. I may just box them all up if they all look decent and the price is right. Legacy Hunter (#5) has done well at the distance and is cutting back, an angle that’s been fairly successful for his trainer, who’s overall stats aren’t bad. The forecast is also calling for rain tonight and this one has won in the slop, if it comes that.

I’m not sure why Take Aim (#6) isn’t the favorite as he’s the only one coming off a win. Kris’s Honor (#7) has also won at the distance and racked up a string of 5 place & shows usually within a length or so of the winner at the end of last year and Hey Reemer is returning to the dirt and reunited with his winning jockey, one of my favorite angles! All of these horses are on the pace runners so they fit the apparent bias going on at Mountaineer.

I’m happy this week’s pool party takes place at night, so all of us working stiffs that can’t watch from work have a chance to watch/wager in real time (even though I’m home sick today and could have watched any race). As always, good luck & have fun!

Update: the one front runner I tossed, Ameliaslandmissle (#9), won at 14-1 and Kris’s Honor (#7) at 3-1 placed. The $2 exacta, or perfecta as they call it at Mountaineer, payed $136. At least my assessment of the front runner bias was right on… see you next week!

Posted by dana on Apr 14 2009    
Filed Under: 2009, HANA, Picks, Exacta, Handicapping, Racing

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This week’s rendition of the HANA Pool Party was fun even though 30-1 shot Behave took me out in the first leg coming out of nowhere to win over one my picks, Celebration Dance, by a neck!

The next leg saw Dovita sit nicely off the pace to beat Barefoot Babe (who I threw out) while one of my picks Doctor Carina had a horrible trip (while being full of run, insult to injury) but still managed to get up for 3rd. Over at the horseplayers teen party chat line (twitter), Eddie D pointed out that Dovita was a “slam dunk” according to ThoroGraph (but that ThoroGraph would not have helped with Behave).

The last leg unfolded roughly like I imagined except that one of my picks, So Very Irish, was scratched. Williamsburg, sat a little further back than I imagined but See I A got softened up by This is my Game (who I overlooked) and Williamsburg made a move and poured on it on to win by 5 1/4 and paying $18, nice!

The $2 Pick 3 payed $14,671.40 and a few folks had it! I kept imagining a local player cashing an unexpectedly fat payout, which I think is kind of nice too. See you around the pool next week!

Posted by dana on Apr 07 2009    
Filed Under: Twitter, HANA, Pick 3, 2009, Payouts, Handicapping, Wrap Up, Racing

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(JSDesign)

Just a reminder that HANA’s second pool party, Target Tampa, is tomorrow. It’s a Pick 3 starting with the 6th race.

CanGamble offers a nice overview of various Pick 3 strategies if multi-race exotics aren’t your thing.

I didn’t spend a ton of time on this and I really like to see claimers in the parade, but here it goes:

$1 2,4,7,10 / 2,4,11 / 4,5 = total $24

I thought the first leg was the toughest and went with several of the chalky picks but threw in Zaam Time (#10 at 30-1) based solely on her ability to rate and win as the rest of field looks to be on the pace types.

I capped the next leg, a turf race, assuming it will be on the turf but liked one of the AEs who’s only win was on dirt with improving turf form (#11). Doctor Carina (#2) is dropping in class and coming in off a freshening with some endurance works. She’s a bit chalky so I’m also going to include Angel in our Jam (#4) as her last win was at the distance on the turf at Tampa + her trainer has a couple of nice stats, 11% first time with team & 50% 61-180 days. 50%! That fact that she’s 20-1 made her more attractive than #3 Barefoot Babe who does seem more reliable at the distance but is 3-1. I’m wondering if Barefoot Babe doesn’t prefer softer turf, her only win was on turf listed as Good and she just hasn’t been able to get up in her last few. Nick’s Girl (#11) looks to be knocking on the door to me. Last out was 6w and just missed by neck, a race that Barefoot Babe ran 5th in.

I love the last leg, particularly because my two picks have decent odds. Williamsburg (#4) looks like a sprinter and this is a 1 mile 40 but his last 2 works have been 5f and his trainer’s sprint/route is 21% (along assorted other nice percentages). They’re also jumping him up in class so I’m guessing his connections feel pretty confident, works for me at 5-1! So Very Irish on the other hand is proven at the distance and can either set the pace or rate. It looks like See I A will set the pace but maybe with a little pressure from Williamsburg he might flame out like his last race. That sets up well for both of my picks. Of course, it could set up REALLY well for African Skies, the 5-2 favorite who’s dropping in class and likes to close, but where’s the fun in that? It is a pool party after all!

Posted by dana on Apr 06 2009    
Filed Under: Claimer, 2009, HANA, Pick 3, Running Style, Picks, Handicapping, You Can Help, Turf, Racing

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(spin979)

Just when you thought you’d heard all the stories there are to be told about the Breeder’s Cup, here’s one more… the TBA is full of kick ass handicappers!

We have an evolving tradition of posting our picks for big events. For last year’s BC we posted them on Patrick’s blog (I picked 3 winners). I believe we posted our picks for the Derby card by way of Google docs but can’t find them (does anyone have that link?).

This year, we posted our BC picks on the TBA homepage (permalink here). We picked a winner for each race and used a mythical $2 WPS bet to track how we faired.

At first I was bummed, using this method I didn’t break even. Then I realized that I picked FOUR winners, which is not too shabby. In fact, not only did I pick 4 winners, so did 4 other folks AND Michael of Gathering the Wind picked FIVE winners! This prompted me to look around a bit to see how fared against others.

The NTRA posted, in their words, Expert Picks, which indeed did include many an expert. How did we do compared to them? Pretty damn good! None of the experts at NTRA picked 5 winners and only Larry Borstein and Mike Watchmaker picked 4!

Let’s look a little closer at the TBA picks. Not only were we impressive in the straight up picking winners department, but our In the Money (ITM) percentages were pretty darn good too. Kevin of Colin’s Ghost was 9/14 ITM for a whopping 64%… take that Pletcher, Asmussen, Dutrow! Also, 17 of the 18 TBA handicappers were 29% or above ITM!

Google docs spreadsheet didn’t let me link the blog name but you can link directly to them by using the TBA navigation to the right, except for the Magic Beer Bottle, which you can find here.

Congrats TBA handicappers, I’d say we did as well as fillies and Euros this year!

Posted by dana on Nov 02 2008    
Filed Under: 2008, Picks, TBA, NTRA, Breeders' Cup, Handicapping, Racing

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A studious vibe at Saratoga, the way it should be (zpousman)

Things get crowded at Saratoga. On our last day we were sitting in front of a row of yammerers. You know the type, they’re not their for the races so they’re gonna chit chat all the live long day.

One woman, with voice so piercing I thought my eyes might pop out of my head every time she spoke, prattled on about the Today Show (multiple segments no less), how one of her craft projects got messed up, gossiped (”he was the best thing that ever happened to her”, “for someone with no money she sure does buy a lot of new things”), and so on. All day. I think she also went on a long soliloquy about some cookies.

In a perfect world, ticketing at Saratoga might work something like this: On the lottery form there is a simple questionnaire. For each ticket requested you must indicate if the potential ticket holder is a racing fan or a tag along such as a spouse, your best pal who’s really not into the ponies and/or any children i.e., anyone likely to chat all day and not pay attention to the races. If anyone in your party is a potential chatter, you all get seated in sections W-Z (sorry, you shouldn’t have brought them or better yet, let them enjoy the picnic area in the paddock).

This would leave the better sections free extraneous blither blather about god knows what and when Jason Blewitt and Jan Rushton give their report from the paddock, those of us who are interested could actually hear it. Another upside is that if all the chatters are sitting together, they might actually end up having more to chat about which could make it a nicer day for them too… see, everyone wins!

Posted by dana on Jul 29 2008    
Filed Under: NYRA, Handicapping, Saratoga, Fans, Racing

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