Start Spreadin' the News....

Tweet ..... we're leaving in three weeks! The chance to see a Triple Crown will be quite exciting! It should be a terrific three weeks of hype leading up to the June 7th third leg. There should be at least one worthy new challenger on the scene (Casino Drive) as well as some Derby comebackers with 5 weeks rest (3rd place finisher Denis of Cork, 4th place finisher Tale of Ekati and maybe one or two others) to attempt to spoil the first TC since 1978. Big Brown put it into another gear with 3 furlongs to go and left his weaker rivals in the dust yesterday in Preakness 133. He was so short a price at 1-5, that the $2 exacta with 40-1 Macho Again paid a measly $36. We had it at $2 and at $1 (collecting $55) to cut the days losses to $45 with Macho ruining the tri play by getting up one spot on Ichabad Crane who was carrying the red-hot Jeremy Rose (ITM eight times including the Preakness). As projected here, Racecar Rhapsody cleaned up the super. We also picked up the Special/Preakness double for 20 beans, mistake not substituting my saver Student Council in my $10 bet when AP Arrow scratched, oh well, live and learn ("that's why they call it gambling"). I kept my Preakness exacta streak alive at four, however!

I was looking back at my 07 and 06 Belmont pictures this morning and the excitement has already started on this end. The 8 1/2 train ride from Buffalo to Penn Station should give us plenty of time to handicap on the eve of Belmont Day, get us into NYC for happy hour at the Campbell Apartment in Grand Central (cool place to grab a cocktail) and on to Balthazar for a little Bouillebaise for dinner, I'm already chomping at the bit for Belmont weekend to arrive. The competition looks like it will be a step up for this race and "The Test of a Champion" will define the greatness of Big Brown or send him like the 10 others before him since 1978 to wonder what could have been...

Photo courtesy: AP/Rob Carr