If this were an ordinary year, Saturday would not be Travers Day. If this were an ordinary year, hundreds of people would line up outside the gates of Saratoga Race Course in the wee hours of the morning, waiting for the gates to open so that they could charge inside to snag their preferred location,…
Saratoga: The GI, $1 million Travers at 1 ¼ miles (Kentucky Derby qualifying points: 100-40-20-10) by Brian Nadeau Brian handicaps at Capital OTB and Horseplayer Now, and he’ll offer analysis and selections of Derby points races, hoping to make us all a little money as we head to the Belmont Stakes. Follow him on Twitter here. #1 First Line…
…the silence was most striking moments later, when track announcer John Imbriale let us know that the stewards were taking a look at the stretch run and that Midnight Bisou’s rider, Ricardo Santana Jr., had lodged an objection against the winner. Ordinarily, we’d have heard cries of disgust from the people holding tickets on,…
As I browsed the Saratoga entries for Saturday, July 25, seeking both good betting races and possible story ideas, I did a quick search for maiden special weights, hoping that some promising juvenile(s). One raced turned up, that for New York-bred fillies and mares, 3 years old and up. I thought I must have screwed…
For years, when I would come to Saratoga Springs, New York, a week or two before the summer meeting began, I would wander around the racecourse, marveling at its beauty, soaking in its silence. Saratoga is my hometown, and, for those few days, I felt like the track was all mine. Selfishly, I wondered what…
Opening weekend at Saratoga Race Course was an exercise in cognitive dissonance. No one lined up outside the gates pre-dawn, waiting to get in and snag their preferred picnic table. No one watched morning workouts. No one joined track announcer John Imbriale in the kick-off toast, “They’re off at Saratoga!” The prestigious Sanford Stakes (G3)…
Lots of people consider their pets part of their families. And while a racehorse might not exactly fit into the category of “pet,” that doesn’t change how trainer Ron Moquett and his family feel about Whitmore, the seven-year-old gelding that will make his 35th start in Saturday’s Grade 1, $250,000 Alfred G. Vanderbilt Stakes. “My…
Saratoga: The GIII, $100,000 Peter Pan at 1 1/8 miles (Kentucky Derby qualifying points: 50-20-10-5) by Brian Nadeau Brian handicaps at Capital OTB and Horseplayer Now, and he’ll offer analysis and selections of Derby points races, hoping to make us all a little money as we head to the Belmont Stakes. Follow him on Twitter here. We kick off…
The CEO of the New York Racing Association, O’Rourke hadn’t yet marked his first anniversary in the position when he was thrust into a maelstrom of a public health emergency, a financial crisis, and zero certainty about the future, both immediate and long-term. On March 7, Aqueduct Racetrack hosted the G3 Gotham Stakes, a…
For some Midlantic trainers who are Saratoga stalwarts, the summer of 2020 may well look similar to their operations in years past. But that doesn’t mean it will feel the same. For the last several years, Graham Motion has rotated horses between his Fair Hill base and his 10 stalls on Saratoga backstretch, leaving the…
Brooklyn Backstretch 