Black-Eyed Susan Day: The Day in Pictures

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That's Fiftyshadesofhay with jockey Joel Rosario up for trainer Bob Baffert after winning the 89th running of the Grade 2 $500,000 Black-Eyed Susan (BES) Stakes at Pimlico Race Course. I arrived yesterday morning and moved around the track all day enjoying the brilliant sunshine and great day of racing that Pimlico serves up on the eve of the Preakness Stakes.

My recap on the BES for The Buffalo News can be found here. In the finale, Bona Venture Stables' Summer of Fun lost a photo in the Old Hilltop Stakes. I spoke with managing partner Dan Collins this morning who said "She came out fine, a little tired. She's just got to learn to keep the lead, that's twice now." She'll likely point towards the Virginia Oaks at Colonial or the Lake George at Saratoga later this summer.

It's a little overcast, but hoping any rain showers will hold off for today. the infield is starting to fill up and the first race goes off at 10:45 a.m. on what is the longest day of racing of the year. Later today I'll be live blogging (starting around 3:00 p.m. at the Sports, Ink blog.

I went with Orb in this morning's paper, but will be protecting against a second place finish with some exacta boxes and perhaps a trifecta keying him in second, should something go awry or if he has to play catch up a la Animal Kingdom.

Here's a look at some pictures from yesterday's travels...

Marathon Lady - second in BES,
Robby Albarado up

Toasting - West Point Thoroughbreds
Javier Castellano in the irons

Fiftyshadesofhay wins the BES

Bob Baffert

Shug McGaughey and Bill Mott

Emotional Kitten - Old Hilltop winner
Joel Rosario aboard for the Ramseys

Chad Brown and Castellano discuss
Premier Step's trip

Doug O'Neill after the Old Hilltop
with Birdlover

View from the Turfside Terrace
one of the best in all of racing

Orb on Preakness morning
in traditional stall 40

That's a wrap on the Black-Eyed Susan....good luck everyone.

Happy Travers Day 2012

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Logo Courtesy NYRA

Happy Travers Day, everyone. It's a beautiful day here at the Spa and a big 13-race card highlighted by a late guaranteed $1 million all-graded stakes Pick-4 should make for a great day in racing.

It's been a light on the posting side this month due to family and work commitments, but we've still been plugging away at our Buffalo News gig, so I'll share a few links to my latest over there.

I took a run at the late Pick-4 in Friday's Sports, Ink weekly column, where I decided to go fairly deep in the King's Bishop and the Ballston Spa (first leg).

I went with Alpha in the Travers and my advance on Kiaran McLaughlin's attempt at the self-coined "Toga Slam" in this morning's paper. I am also favoring Nonios who ran a superb race in the Haskell late last month after a less than superb ride (in my humble opinion) by Corey Nakatani. Hall-of-Famer Johnny V gets the ride today, so he is a win threat.  Neck 'n Neck is getting a little buzz in the press box this morning, but I'm not entirely sold on him. There seems to be a lack of pace in the race and I think Alpha appears to be the best of the bunch. But, as you know, they don't run the race on paper.

Had a fun day yesterday hanging with my dad, we've somehow made this an annual event (our third straight Travers together).  We sat on the Porch (a great place to watch the races at the Spa) and enjoyed Friday's card, which included the $500K Grade 1 Ballerina. We made a big comeback late in the day around Turbulent Descent in some late Pick-3's to avoid disaster.

This morning's highlight was driving up the Northway listening to HRRN who had the Times-Union and friend Tim Wilkin on. He was explaining how he was encouraged to join twitter to Jude Feld, the host, and that his first tweet was "Tweeting is for morons" and went on to explain that he didn't realize his tweets were simultaneously posted on the T-U home sports page. He went on to say his editors weren't exactly pleased.  If you get a chance, check out the podcast of this morning's Equine Forum at the HRRN site. We laughed all the way to the track.

It's a big Toga Party contest day with three available points. Last week, Mike Mac, They're in the Gate and yours truly hit Alabama glory with Questing. The selections are up for today's Travers Stakes and the earlier selections for the $2 trifecta and today's attendance.

We should have a picture essay up early next week, have a great day at the races. Good luck at the windows!

Happy Oaks Day

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Happy Oaks Day 2012!

I arrived at the Churchill Downs backstretch in Louisville yesterday morning at 6 a.m. in time to catch the Derby/Oaks horses gallop on the Churchill dirt track.

Keith McCalmont, of TripleDeadHeat and Woodbine fame, accompanied me on the trip from Buffalo, an 8:23 if you're scoring from home (not bad), definitely record time for yours truly.

We made a management decision on Wednesday evening to drive through the night and hit the backstretch at sunrise. It proved to be a good decision, which gave us an opportunity to visit with some of the connections and watch the horses lightly work out.

Union Rags looked his usual tremendous self, and Gemologist really caught my eye -- he looks ready to roll. I spent some time with Gail Cox, who Keith introduced me to, the trainer of Woodbine hopeful Hard Not to Like, a filly running in today's $1 million Grade 1 Kentucky Oaks. You can see my race analysis on The Buffalo News Sports, Ink blog that was posted this morning. We'll be live blogging from that blog site starting around noon tomorrow on Derby day, so be sure to stop by sometime during the day. My advance for the Derby (including selections) will be in tomorrow's TBN and I will post a link here tomorrow when it is live on the website

Speaking of tomorrow's big race, the final Wireplayers.com Derby Dozen was posted this week and it looks like Gemologist came out on top. It's a fun poll that I am happy to be a contributor to.

Here is a look at some of the views from Churchill Downs:

Churchill Backstretch at Sunrise

Pletcher giving early morning instructions

Alpha

Broadway's Alibi

Gemologist

El Padrino

Hansen

Prospective

Steve Asmussen with Daddy Knows Best
in the paddock before schooling

Hansen schooling in paddock

Union Rags

Enjoy the Oaks and Good Luck!

BuffaLuck, Ranallo & Turf Accountants

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No, this isn't a post about the Andrew Luck sweepstakes, but another racing blog that will discuss the new HBO series Luck. I wasn't planning on discussing it other than maybe a random bullet point in a random blog....however...


I received an circuitous email sent by USA Today sportswriter and Buffalo native Erik Brady via one of my partners with the same last name (no relation) discussing the Buffalo connections of the series. Here's what I gleaned from the email:


- David Milch, the show's producer, is Buffalo-born and raised, which explains the obscure name dropping of the one-time Buffalo newspaper Courier-Express during the show. "What are you," asks the horseplayer  in the wheelchair played by Kevin Dunn, “the morning Courier-Express?” 


- Milch's childhood idol was the late Courier-Express columnist Phil Ranallo, who wrote a daily column called "What's New Harry." The column featured horseplayer Honest Harry who would dive into his many forays at the racetrack, along with his wife, Ruby.  Ranallo also happened to win the Eclipse Award for Outstanding Newspaper Writing in 1972.


- The Buffalo News' Art Director Jeff Simon wrote this review on his former classmate Milch's newest HBO series.


Who knew the various connections to Buffalo. What did I think? Well, I'm intrigued by it so far and it's way too early to make any snap judgments about its potential success. I enjoyed the racing scenes and the Pick Six players the most. I liked how they explained to the casual viewer what a "single" in the bet represented and that the scene keyed on the singled horse. The scene was breathtaking as the "bug boy" was boxed in and forced to shoot up the rail to win the key race in the sequence. 


They had to lay out a whole array of characters over the hour long show, so it did take some time to develop. While the racetrack lingo could be considered to be confusing to the non-racing fan viewer, I think in time folks will pick up on what's going on and all in all this could be very good for racing and generating new fans.


While hitting a $2.7M Pick Six doesn't happen everyday, it's similar to the way most of us were hooked on the game. A nice score and adrenaline pumping through the veins when your horse crosses the line first. We've all experienced it. That dance that the guy was doing in the hallway, yep, I know that dance.


I for one, am looking forward to giving it a chance and seeing the main characters played by Dustin Hoffman, Nick Nolte and Dennis Farina and how they develop.


On a side note, I was having lunch with my friend Moe (not my Uncle) and he mentioned that his son, a graduate of the Naval Academy, had given him a Winston Churchill book filled with quotes from the famous Englishman. He said he stumbled on the term, turf accountants, in the book and asked if I had ever heard of it. He explained that is the term used in the UK for bookmakers. We'll file that tidbit in the
"you learn something new every day" folder.

Buffalo Today, Hot Tamale

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All signs point towards racing tomorrow even with anticipated high temperatures. I happened to be on a 3:59 excursion in August of 2006 when the one and only cancellation happened at Saratoga Race Course due to the high heat index that Wednesday morning.

The (former) Saratoga Resident, G-Money and I will be heading out first thing in the morning for the Spa and some weekend action at my favorite place in the world.

I wrote an advance article for The Buffalo News that was in this morning's paper on the coming meet where I highlighted some of my favorite things about the 'ole Spa. Check tomorrow morning's Sports, Ink blog for my handicap of the very competitive Coaching Club American Oaks, which features the winning fillies of the Kentucky Oaks, Black-Eyed Susan, Acorn, Mother Goose and Fantasy Stakes. It should be a terrific initial Grade 1 to kick off the meet. NBC will televise the CCAO with an hour broadcast Saturday afternoon.

I missed my first opener in five years last year due to family and business obligations, but we're re-starting the streak tomorrow. I spent time before this blog looking back at pictures of my first opener in 2006 and my first attendance at morning workouts at the main track.

If you haven't got your Toga Party IV picks into me, I'll extend them to emails received prior to post time tomorrow. Most of the usual cast of characters are back, but the more the merrier!

As for tomorrow's card, the James Marvin looks like a tremendous betting race. Leaning towards Here Comes Ben and Jersey Town. As for the Grade 3 Schuylerville, I like Vuvovar (8-1 ML) off a sharp workout for conditioner Eric Guillot. After picking consecutive winners publicly in the first two legs of the Canadian Triple Crown, let's hope I can keep it rollin' in the US and A.

Enjoy opening day, there's no other place to be...

Happy Oaks Day!

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The Space Gal and I made it down to Louisville last night safely. This is her first Derby so she's plenty excited and just bought her first Oaks Day hat.  The bad weather they have been predicting all week looks to have passed by and the sky is clear and looks to be an awesome Oaks Day.

I'm blessed to be covering the event for The Buffalo News and had my preview in today's print edition. Fortunately, I stayed away from Uncle Mo in my analysis as I had a hunch on Wednesday night he wouldn't make the gate. His connections announced the scratch this morning at the Auxiliary Press Center shortly before 9am.  [Derby Update 10:59am: Robby Albarado is off Animal Kingdom and John Velazquez has picked up the mount]

As far as the Oaks goes today, I like Zazu, the California filly who has battled the very talented Turbulent Descent last two times out.  If you want to join some of the bloggers in a handicapping contest, the TBA is having the annual Oaks/Derby contest (open to all).  Click here to enter your selections and go for the gusto (as well as bragging rights).  My Oaks post should be up later this morning at the Sports, Ink blog.

Finally, tomorrow I will be live blogging the Derby at the Sports, Ink site and will post a link tomorrow once it's live. So I've got my hands full for a couple of days, but enjoying every minute of it.  Time to go check out the Space Gal's hat!

Wood Day

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We're in a joyous mood this bright sunny Saturday morning in Buffalo, thanks to the guy to the left (Nathan Gerbe) who scored two goals last night for the Sabres in a playoff-clinching OT thriller against the Flyers.  Check out the awesomeness of his spin-o-rama goal in the third period in the clip at the end of the post.

It's Wood Day, unfortunately tax season has prevented me from attending the big day at the Big A.  But that doesn't mean we don't have opinions and such. We took a quick stab at the Guaranteed $500K Pick Four last night and came up with the following:

G3 Comely:  3-Her Smile (3-1) is my top choice with David Cohen up for trainer Leigh Delacour. Looking for her to continue to improve third off the layoff after two races at Tampa (one on the turf). Beaten last out by Wyomia, who goes later today in the Ashford at Keeneland.  Also using the NY-bred Hushion horse 5-Ava K. who tries graded company for the first time and the Pletcher horse 2-R Holiday Mood, winner of two straight.

G3 BayShore: 3-JJ's Lucky Train has done little wrong during his 3-year old campaign, has been at Aqueduct before and the place horse in his last outing won the non-graded $75K Private Terms at Laurel. We'll also include the Vindication colt 7-Vengeful Wildcat and 8-Royal Currier looking for a price. I'm throwing out Royal Currier's Hutcheson based on his horrible start and looking at past races at Aqueduct he was only beaten by a good colt, Fort Hughes in the Jimmy Winkfield.

G1 Carter: Best race on the card. What's not to like about 7-Apriority? Comes out of an optional race at Gulfstream for trainer David Fawkes and owner Donald Dizney. Going a little deeper in here with two more horses, the Pletcher/Dominguez 1-Calibrachoa, who shows a win over the main track and two Grade 3 victories to his credit. He'll be looking for his fifth straight for Repole Stables.  We'll throw in 10-Morning Line, Zito's classy horse, still looking for his first Grade 1 victory. Still debating on 3-Laysh Laysh Laysh and 4-Kensei, but most likely will use neither. [UPDATE: Calibrachoa has been scratched due to soreness in his feet...so thinking LLL]

G1 Wood: Free square. Uncle Mo. You can see my analysis on this race at my Sports, Ink blog at The Buffalo News here.

Well, you know Triple Crown season has arrived when the following occur: (1) Claims of a weak 3-year old crop; (2) Defections due to injury (see To Honor and Serve and Premier Pegasus) and (3) no major TV coverage of a huge prep weekend. Three big preps today and I'll have to go to TVG for the Wood and Illinois Derby and HRTV or TwinSpiresTV for the Santa Anita Derby. Ugh.

On a positive television note, the Black-Eyed Susan, one of my favorite days will be televised for the first time by the NBC-owned Versus channel. This is an excellent development, several years ago I put up a poll on the site as to who would do a great job covering horse racing, and Versus was at or near the top. It will be interesting to see how they do with racing coverage, if it's anything like how they cover the NHL, it should be decent.

Speaking of the NHL...here's a look at that Gerbe goal (and about five replays!)....Enjoy the weekend!

Rolling Along

Tweet So while Lady Gaga rolled into town last night, I was enjoying a nice relaxing story at Barnes & Noble where Clifford the Big Red Dog made a special appearance. Needless to say, the Space Kid was beside himself. Priceless stuff.

So next up for him is the Sesame Street Live show that the Space Gal will be taking him to tomorrow afternoon, which leaves me and the Space Filly alone to tackle the NHC Tour online tournament.

We'll attempt to live blog the action through the action in between bottles and diapers...should be some good laughs. So check back tomorrow and see how we're coping in the Space Station and whether my new little good luck charm can add to the fun. I will say that as much as I criticize the NTRA on this site, they did make a good move in lowering the NHC tour buy-in to $45 this year. It enticed me to join and play the online tournaments and maybe jump into the higher buy-in tourneys once busy season is over. The good side of the ledger has at least one lonely check mark.

I did the live contest blog back in November on Delta Jackpot day and had some fun with it, so we'll give it another shot. The contest races are from Fair Grounds, Sam Houston and Oaklawn, 3 tracks I do not play often and Gulfstream Park. So basically it will be a good exercise in crash and burn tactics or watching a train wreck for those tuning in from home.

I did have some time this week to analyze the Gotham Stakes for The Buffalo News, take a peak at who I think will emerge from the Big Apple and an interesting longshot possibility.

Volume III of the Wireplayers.com Derby Dozen was issued earlier in the week and the list was shaken up quite a bit with the loss of To Honor and Serve and wins by Mucho Macho Man and Soldat since the last poll was out. The comments are very funny and add some spice as its not your ordinary, everyone-has-one type of Derby poll.

Back in sixty seconds....(not really, but I'll be back tomorrow with the live contest blog).

Checking In

Tweet Saturday maintenance post for the weekend. Cleaning the salt off the car and wondering why the check engine light is on at the blog? Here's some odds and ends as we head into a holiday weekend of racing.

I took a look at the Fair Grounds all-stakes Pick 4 for The Buffalo News in my Sports, Ink Blog post yesterday, check it out.

Prayers go out to Eibar Coa who is in surgery this morning after fracturing vertebra in his neck in a horrific spill at Gulfstream yesterday.

I had a nice visit on Wednesday to Fort Erie Race Track to meet with Elissa Blowe, Manager of Media & Marketing for the FELRC who showed me their new RaceBook and shared plans for the 2011 live racing season at the Fort. My article in today's News on my visit can be found here.

The TBA's Road to the Roses League is up and running thanks to new league manager Tony Bada Bing, who writes the A Leg Up blog, and was winner of the 2010 EquiSpace Toga Party contest (like how I plug my contest?). [League Number: 428912689 Activation Code: 2771589346] Sign up and play along with the TBA bloggers. There are some other leagues out there, I plan up signing up for the HRF and Wireplayers.com RTTR leagues this year also. (Feel free to post your activation codes in the comments section!)

Good luck this weekend and let's cash some tickets!

Shoveling It...

Tweet The mercury hit a balmy 40 degrees in the B-lo today. My back hurts. My feet hurt. The bottom of my driveway can only fit one car out due to my less than stellar snow shoveling skills. Of course, Mother Nature waited until our city was holding its annual Winter Fest before melting all the snow, but hey, that's Buffalo for you.


So what's been cooking in the Space Station lately....


- The Space Kid turned two and he's got Keeneland, Churchill, Gulfstream and Saratoga notches on his belt. Not bad for two, eh?


- Posting has been a little light lately due to the time of the year (tax season) and keeping up with my responsibilities for The Buffalo News. My latest article on betting Derby Futures was in Saturday's print edition and can be found here, in case you missed it (h/t to the Paulick Report for the nice linkage).

- ThoroFan Chairman Michael Amo, was one of the invited guests to testify last Monday in front of the Senate Committee on Racing, Wagering and Gaming. The post hearing media has mostly been focused around the NYC OTB's and consolidation, but his speech on behalf of racing fans is a good read. All of the written testimony from last Monday's hearing in Albany can be found here.


- Planning on a visit to Fort Erie Race Track this week to check out what's new on the other side of the border.


- Here's where you can find the RSS feed of The News' Sports, Ink blog to see my weekly posts every Friday.As other posts are included here, other than mine, you can filter them on the right hand sidebar under "horse racing." Check it out.


- I was very impressed watching Brethren smoke the Davis field, and was surprised to see the 83 Beyer. The best recap I've read is at the outstanding SB Nation Down The Stretch blog, where Matt explains why he thinks Brethren was issued such a low Beyer.


- Suffered my second bad beat of the year on Saturday when edged out of the Gulfstream Pick 4 beaten by a head in the final leg when my 9-1 choice Safety Squeeze couldn't get past 8-1 Green Bluff and $1,200 went up in smoke. I was at a friend's house who has his own kegerater..so that made it all better. GP hasn't been very kind to me this winter. Earlier in the meet, Tar Heel Mom kicked me out of a carryover Pick 5 in the fourth leg (paid $4,200), with double digit winners on the front and back end, picking up a 4/5 conso. I had Hilda's Passion that day...of course she beat Mom today in the Hurricane Bertie. Needless to say, they were both on my ticket today.


- The El Camino Real Derby must have been bittersweet for Steve Asmussen, who had the prohibitive favorite Comma to the Top, falter, but his stablemate Silver Medallion picked up some solid graded earnings. It'll be interesting to see where both of them end up next.

- I am looking forward to next weekend's Risen Star, with Machen, Rogue Romance, Santiva and Wilkinson all probables to run at the Fair Grounds.

Things are starting to heat up (literally) and....we're not dead yet...and, by the way, if you see any of those 50.6 million fans, can you have them stop by this blog? (PS - I vote Fiction).

Space Invasion: Big A (The Spaceman Cometh Again)

Tweet I selected quite a day to visit the Big A last week. Little did I know when making plans for my annual January business trip to the Big Apple that Mother Nature would dump 16-18 inches of snow into the area.


I had booked a Delta flight into nearby JFK which would get me in by noon so I could catch most of the card. When that flight canceled first thing in the morning, I scrambled to get on a JetBlue flight that would land me at Aqueduct sometime around Race 4.
Somehow we made it and I arrived in time to watch the 4th. I was disappointed I didn't get to see the 3rd which had a number of decent 3-year old fillies, won by It's Tricky ($3.20). Last year's Schuylerville winner Le Mi Geaux finished third. I only made two wagers on the day so I could walk around and enjoy the day. I spent a lot of time perusing the old photos on the wall from Saratoga, Belmont and Aqueduct.
I scored an Aqueduct ski hat, the last one left in the NYRA store for a bargain $2. That was worth the trip for me. Well, that and hitting the late Pick 4 with a 5x3x2x1 sequence that paid $59. I also had a 25-1 in the first race that came in second, but doubling your money is better than a sharp stick in the eye, no?
The 7th (2nd leg) of the late Pick 4, was won by Awesome Bull ($7.20), who impressed me with a solid victory. Don't you hate when your three horses in the Pick 4 complete the trifecta and you don't play it? Oh well. He kept me alive and I was happy to see him run...here's a picture of him in the snowy paddock:














I wrapped up my day spending time with TRNY pal Ernie Munick who is always great to catch up with everything going on in his world. We watched the last two races together, including a brilliant ride by Eddie Castro on Inherit the Gold in the Mr. International S.

I didn't check out any of the construction and only went outside to watch the Awesome Bull victory as the temperature was hovering around 10-15 degrees. The place was pretty crowded for a Wednesday afternoon, I'm having trouble finding the actual attendance figures. I'm glad the card actually went off as they canceled racing for Thursday. As for this Buffalo guy, a little snow didn't hamper my spirits or my time at the Big A.

Speaking of Buffalo...here's my latest Post Time blog on the initial trek down the 2011 Derby Trail in The News.

Sunday Slippers

Tweet Today is definitely a prop the feet up on the couch type of Sunday. Thanks to the NFL for not starting until 3pm today! That way we can continue our Tampa experiment.....

- I decided to play Tampa Bay Downs this weekend, for no apparent reason other than the TVG Bonanza contest. Of course, in the "I Never Read the Rules" department, I skimmed them and made all 10 of my $20 WP wagers on Saturday, thinking I had 10 more to make today. I did fairly well winning $498 on $400 wagered, with 4 winners and a second and some decent price horses. I played along as well and hit two moderate Pick 3's. We're playing again today before the football games start up. Lots of low level claimers, but the track seemed to be playing fair and the answers are always somewhere in those past performances.

- The 6th Race at Tampa is extremely interesting today, where three of the five remaining entries in the $24,500 Allowance are stakes horses, including You Go West Girl, Keertana and Romacaca. I'll be siding with Romacaca with Daniel Centeno up. She finished 4th in the Beverly D at Arlington last summer and I think she'll go wire to wire here.

- Other stuff going on...I'm again a willing participant in the Wireplayers.com Derby Dozen and the only person to select To Honor and Serve as his #1 horse over Uncle Mo. I have good vibes about this horse and look forward to his next race. Of course, it's way too early in the game to be selecting Derby horses, but what I like about participating it makes me do my homework on pedigree and statistics about the top contenders. I was a big Bernardini fan, so he has some decent pedigree, his dam Pilfer won 3 of 11 starts. Trainer Bill Mott will be looking to add to his new found Triple Crown trail success after training last year's Belmont Stakes winner Drosselmeyer.

- I wrote a quick recap of the Eclipse Awards earlier in the week for The Buffalo News....which you can find here.

- Buffalo Raceway opened a week ago Friday and the first race winner paid over $100! Not a bad way to start a meeting!

- My Ice Ice Baby post from the 2009 Belmont Stakes has been getting some mongo hits, based on a photo I took of Jeannine Edwards in the paddock...Word to your Mother!

Enjoy Championship Sunday, and put on those slippers!

Must be a Buffalo Thing

Tweet It seemed like every time I turned around this weekend there was a Buffalo guy or someone tied to Buffalo's past that was on television doing something great. It's been that way since New Year's Eve when a little known harness racer named Boomer Berman splashed onto the ESPN scene in Chris Berman's "Two Minute Drill" (video at end of the post).

I spent Friday afternoon touring Buffalo Raceway with Chief Operating Officer, James Mango and Marketing Director Jonathan Cramer preparing for an article on Friday's opening of the 69th season of racing at the half mile track for The News. I look forward to sharing more insights into my visit in future posts and a Space Invasion visit during a winter weekend in the coming months. Western New York is fortunate to have a customer-friendly harness track in our backyard, if you're from this part of the State be sure to check it out.

The week didn't start off so good for our neighbors to the north who squandered a three goal lead to the Russians who scored five unanswered third period goals to upset the Canadians in the World Juniors gold medal game. Buffalo's airport was in the news on Thursday when Delta officials refused to let the Russian team on the plane, due to...ummm...being a bit overserved.

Yesterday former Bills running back Marshawn Lynch played pinball through former Bills coach Gregg Williams' defensive secondary, with an exhilarting 67 yard touchdown. That highlight has been seen over 1,000 times now, but it gets better every time.

This afternoon, another former Bills running back Willis McGahee broke a few tackles en route to a back breaking touchdown in Kansas City, highlighted by a tomahawk chop taunt in the end zone after the run.

Finally, former University of Buffalo running back James Starks and sixth round draft choice of the Green Bay Packers was called into duty for an injury-riddled backfield only to set a Packer rookie rushing record in a playoff game. He carried 23 times for 123 yards to lead the Packers over the Eagles and completed the Buffalo running back trifecta for the weekend.

I already have my year's baddest beat in the G3 Fort Lauderdale Stakes today when 11-1 Blues Street was beaten by a nostril by 12-1 Little Mike at Gulfstream Park. That's why they call it gambling. Back to the drawing board.

As promised here is our very own Boomer Berman on ESPN (via @BuffaloRaceway):

Happy New Year, Space Cadets

Tweet Happy New Year to all that follow this blog. 2010 has been very good to me and I owe a debt of gratitude to those who visit, have befriended me and have provided me opportunities over the past year.

2010 had a lot of highlights for me and the blog that included:

- The entrance of the Space Filly in November, whose barely a month old. I look forward to her first track visit, she's got some catching up to do!

- A successful initial endeavor with ThoroFan resulting in a new collaboration with the TBA to provide a weekly Handicappers' Corner. I'm told that it generates a solid number of weekly hits and we've given out some terrific winners in 2010 (highlighted by Joe Nevills' 20-1 shot Exhi in the Blue Grass Stakes). We'll be gunning up the 2011 Corner in January for a second consecutive year.

- Speaking of ThoroFan, I was honored to be asked to sit on their Board of Directors in October and look forward to a long relationship with this non-for-profit 501c3 into the future.

- I participated in the inaugural Wireplayers.com Derby Dozen which was a great exercise that we all had a lot of fun with.

- I was fortunate to add 3 more initial track visits (Space Invasions) this year, Finger Lakes, Aqueduct and Pimlico (for the Preakness), ironically two of the three are located in my home state.

- My Belmont Stakes streak is intact at five. The Space Gal and I watched from the finish line to see Drosselmeyer upset the field and had a great day at Big Sandy.

- Calling the Derby exacta cold (and hitting the Oaks-Derby Double cold with my man Ernie), and winning an iPad to boot in a Horse Racing Nation contest.

- The Space Kid added the fourth track to his young life in January on Sunshine Millions Day at Gulfstream. By age two, he's been to Churchill, Keeneland, Saratoga and Gulfstream....not too shabby.

- Finally, in the being in the right place at the right time category, being asked to fill the huge shoes of Bob Summers as the racing correspondent for The Buffalo News, was certainly the highlight of my "racing year." You can check out my year in review from yesterday's paper. Thanks to everyone who helped me make this leap of faith from the blogging ranks.

I'd say 2010 was quite a year after reviewing the highlights above. I look forward to 2011 and am resolved to continue to post and have fun with this blog. I appreciate the regular readers and commenters (Norm!), my fellow TBA'ers and those who happen to stop by on occasion to see what's cooking in the Space Lab. And finally a special thanks to the Saratoga Resident who introduced me to this sport a short seven years ago....who knew?

Happy New Year.

Comma Sense

Tweet It's one of those days....

- Yeah, that was fun waiting for the CashCall Futurity yesterday while the favorite and ultimate winner Comma to the Top waited to for someone to run down to Payless and get him a new pair of shoes. Luckily, the Syracuse-Iona game was on SNY so the 35 minute delay didn't mess me up too much. Regardless, the horse looked impressive, as did the late run of JP's Gusto, but shouldn't he have been scratched? This is up to the stewards?

- Fun fact: Per Urban Dictionary.com comma to the top is another way to say apostrophe. The blog site I link above was "inspired by hearing people refer to what the world knows as an "apostrophe" (') called a "comma to the top." What is wrong with the word apostrophe? Why are we redesigning grammar? I've dedicated this to similar public faux pas, grammatical errors, misspelling and pure irony found in public media." I'll bet you can find an Amar'e sighting in there somewhere.

- Fish Squished, 17-14. Always a joy. Speaking of football...that D-Jack return was crazy today.

- The TBA photo contest is in full swing. Vote now. (Well not right now, after you finish reading me).

- Feeling overly sensitive about my apostrophe use; just because you're paranoid doesn't mean someone's not watching.

- In case you missed them, my article in The Buffalo News on technology aids for horseplayers and my racing gift ideas post for the racing fan in your life in The News' Sports, Ink Blog.

- Finished 352nd in the Equibase Capping Tourney at Hollyrock this weekend. Swept three straight (races 6-8) which paid $62.80 for the Pick 3 if you played it (I didn't), but could only muster a second earlier in the contest. Another reason I don't play the Cali tracks...and it's not because of a boycott sponsored by...oh I'm not going there.

- Did you hear that the 2011 NHC Tour membership is only $45?

- Rolling out something new here at the blog later this week...stay tuned.

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Tweet It's been quite a week at the Space Station as a number of things had my attention this week, the most exciting being my new side gig at The Buffalo News. I guess you couldn't ask for a better present yesterday, when I celebrated the 25th anniversary of my 22nd birthday. I'm looking forward to this opportunity, mainly because of the people I will be fortunate enough to encounter in this role. Another positive angle will be ramping up on the harness game, which is very prevalent in the Western New York area with Buffalo Raceway right in our backyard and Batavia Downs a half hour down the Thruway. My next article should be in next Friday's print edition with a Breeders' Cup preview. Thanks to all of you who have supported me over the last two and a half years (especially the Space Gal who is a saint in her own right).

Over at ThoroFan, I was asked to write an article on my Most Memorable Breeders' Cup Race, but instead I enlisted a number of my blogger pals (Alan H from The Bug Boys, Susan from A Saturday Afternoon Horse, Steve from Wireplayers and Patrick from Handride), Ernie "E Train" Munick of BC360 and TRNY fame and Dylan J, a frequent Wireplayers contributor to help me with the post. I'd like to publicly thank all of them for the effort and the time that each one of them put into the post. What is your most memorable BC race?

I did receive another email regarding the 30 for 30 Charismatic documentary, which said that it would no longer be a part of that series, but rather a future ESPN Films production. The mystery as to the delays and removal from 30 for 30 schedule still have me scratching my head.

Time to get back to those voluminous BC past performances....