🏇Morning Line by MyWinners: 15 Breeders' Cup tickets in 3 days. Keeneland opens.
Hi there
Fifteen Breeders' Cup tickets in three days. Keeneland opens today. Belmont runs its Preview Day tomorrow. Santa Anita runs its preps. The Arc goes Sunday morning on the World Pool. And yesterday, because the rain took Belmont's whole weekend, NYRA did something I've never seen and stacked six washed-out stakes onto a single Thursday card. This is the week the Breeders' Cup fields get drawn in pen, and almost every race that matters is live in your app. That's the hook. Here's the confession.
Belmont losing Saturday and Sunday left me with no racing to hide behind, and my wife took this as a sign from above. I was informed that we would be attending the World's Largest 🍕 Pizza Costume Party on the New Haven Green, and that I would be dressed as a slice. Not "we." I. She wore a jacket.
So at six o'clock last Friday, 700 of us stood on the Green in foam pepperoni trying to break the Guinness World Record for the most people dressed as food. We came up about 100 short. A hundred. In racing terms, we got nailed on the line by a horse we never saw coming. The record stands. The Boys & Girls Clubs got a pile of money, which is the part that matters, and and I got photographed by the Yale Daily News, which is not.
Before you ask: no, that is not the costume. The costume photos exist. My wife has them. She has described them as "insurance." What you're looking at is yesterday at Eli's across the street from the office, eating the subject matter out of spite. Four slices. Also, I said last week that if Forged Steel wired the Goodwood I'd eat the newsletter. He didn't wire it, technically. He sat off the pace and took over on the far turn. He still won at 12/1 and paid $27.60 and my trifecta still died, so the lawyers say I owe. Negotiations are ongoing. This was a goodwill gesture.
Enough pizza, let's get into it. Tons of great racing this week.
WHAT'S ON THIS WEEK
🏇TODAY (Fri 2 Oct) · 🇺🇸 Keeneland · FALL MEET OPENS · Alcibiades (G1, $650K) + Phoenix (G2) + Jessamine (G2) · 3 BC WAYI · 1pm ET · 🇺🇸 Belmont Park · 3 stakes, $525K · 1:10pm ET · 🇺🇸 Thistledown · ADDED CARD · 🇺🇸 Red Mile · Bluegrass 2YO finals (harness) · 1pm ET
🏇TOMORROW (Sat 3 Oct) · 🇺🇸 Keeneland · FALL STARS SATURDAY · Coolmore Turf Mile (G1, $1.25M) + First Lady (G1, $800K) + Breeders' Futurity (G1, $650K) + TCA (G2) + Woodford (G2) · 3 BC WAYI · $3.5M · 1pm ET · 🇺🇸 Belmont Park · BC PREVIEW DAY · Champagne (G1, $500K, 3:53pm ET) + Frizette (G1, $500K) + Pilgrim (G2) + Miss Grillo (G2) + Futurity (G3) + Matron (G3) · 4 BC WAYI · $1.9M · 12:05pm ET · 🇺🇸 Santa Anita · American Pharoah (G1) + Oak Leaf (G2) + Rodeo Drive (G2) · 3 BC WAYI · 🇨🇦 Woodbine · Canadian International (G1, $750K) + 3 more · 1:05pm ET · 🇺🇸 Delaware Park · Delaware Handicap (G3, $500K) · 🇺🇸 Red Mile · KENTUCKY FUTURITY DAY (harness) · 🇺🇸 Dayton · Pacing Derby (G1, $250K) (harness)
🏇 SUNDAY (Sun 4 Oct) · 🇫🇷 Longchamp · THE ARC · 9:05am ET · World Pool · 🇺🇸 Keeneland · Spinster (G1, $650K) + Bourbon (G2) · 2 BC WAYI · 1pm ET · 🇺🇸 Santa Anita · Zuma Beach (G3) + Surfer Girl (G3) · 🇨🇦 Woodbine · Cup & Saucer ($300K)
GREYHOUNDS (nightly, Tue-Sun) 🐕 · 🇺🇸 Wheeling Downs + Tri-State · 🇦🇺 Australian greyhounds overnight · 4% cashback
🏇🎂 KEENELAND OPENS, $6.35 MILLION
Keeneland turns 90 this month and it's throwing the party at the gate. The fall meet opens today and the first three days are Fall Stars Weekend: eleven stakes, $6.35 million in purses, six Grade 1s, and eight automatic Breeders' Cup berths. The Breeders' Cup itself is at Keeneland on October 30 and 31, so every horse that wins this weekend gets to stay home.
Today is the two-year-olds and the sprinters. The Darley Alcibiades (G1, $650K) sends its winner to the Juvenile Fillies, the Phoenix (G2, $400K) to the Sprint, and the Jessamine (G2, $400K) to the Juvenile Fillies Turf. First post 1pm ET. Rob's opening day guide has all three fields.
Tomorrow is the one to clear your afternoon for. The Coolmore Turf Mile (G1, $1.25M) is a Mile qualifier and drew nine. Zulu Kingdom won the Maker's Mark Mile over this course in the spring for Chad Brown and is the one to beat. Lake Forest ships in for William Haggas off a second in the City of York, the race Notable Speech won before he went to Woodbine, so the form line is real. Rhetorical, Title Role, and Kupuna fill it out. The Claiborne Breeders' Futurity (G1, $650K, 1 1/16 miles) is the Juvenile qualifier with six runners, three of them unbeaten: Coach Pope for Kenny McPeek, and the Saratoga debut winners American History (Pletcher) and Q B Rocket (Cox). Somebody's getting their first loss. The one who's already lost is the interesting one: Phone Booth ships in from California for Doug O'Neill off a second in the Del Mar Futurity, and his owners, Paul and Zillah Reddam, have a habit of winning big races in Kentucky (two Kentucky Derbys, if you're counting). Second in a G1 at Del Mar reads better than first in a maiden at Saratoga. The First Lady (G1, $800K) drew eleven fillies and mares on the turf, led by Classic Q, Expensive Queen (Jenny Wiley winner), and Mandanaba for Graffard. The Thoroughbred Club of America (G2, $400K) is a Filly & Mare Sprint qualifier with last year's winner Praying back, and the Woodford (G2, $400K) turf sprint has Nobals, the 2023 Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint winner, still going at $1.95 million earned.
Sunday closes with the Juddmonte Spinster (G1, $650K), the Distaff qualifier, and the Castle & Key Bourbon (G2, $400K) for the Juvenile Turf.
Keeneland pools are deep and the 10-cent superfecta is back this meet. Every race streams live in the app.
🏇🏆 BELMONT'S BREEDERS' CUP PREVIEW
Belmont lost two days to a nor'easter last weekend, ran six stakes on a Thursday to catch up (Far Bridge back from a six-month layoff in the Joe Hirsch, Chad Brown going for a ninth Flower Bowl with Kathynmarissa), and then turns straight around tomorrow with the biggest two-year-old card on the East Coast. How it went: Minaret Station ran down Far Bridge by a half-length in the Joe Hirsch for his first Grade 1, paid $13.72, and survived a stewards' inquiry to keep it. Kathynmarissa wore down the European Sunlit Uplands in the Flower Bowl, Chad Brown's ninth, and she's in the Filly & Mare Turf. And the Vosburgh went to T Kraft by a nose over Crazy Mason from the rail, so the horse that dead-heated for second in the Forego is now in the Breeders' Cup Sprint. Minaret Station at 7/2 last week was the value call, and it landed. First post 12:05pm ET, and note NYRA has revised the post times for this card, so check the MyWinners app rather than the program you printed last week.
The Champagne (G1, $500K, 1 mile, 3:53pm ET) is back at Belmont for the first time since 2022 and it's a Juvenile qualifier. Gaudreau won his Saratoga debut as the favorite, and the horse he beat that day, Coach Pope, has won since and runs in the Breeders' Futurity at Keeneland tomorrow. That's the form line of the weekend. The Frizette (G1, $500K, 1 mile) is the fillies' equivalent and a Dirt Dozen race for the Juvenile Fillies. Seven entered. Libby Lloyd is the one the handicappers like after a sharp Saratoga debut. Revenge of the Sis, She's a Twelve, and Girls Wear Pearls are the ones with upside.
Then the turf. The Pilgrim (G2, $250K) sends its winner to the Juvenile Turf, the Miss Grillo (G2, $250K) to the Juvenile Fillies Turf, and the Futurity (G3, $200K) to the Juvenile Turf Sprint. The Matron (G3, $200K) rounds out six graded stakes worth $1.9 million. All two-year-olds, all on the same card. If you want to see the Breeders' Cup juvenile fields before they're fields, this is the afternoon.
🏇🇫🇷 THE ARC: CAN DARYZ DO WHAT NO COLT HAS DONE SINCE 1978?
Sunday morning, 9:05am ET, we head to Longchamp in Paris. The biggest race in Europe, and it's a World Pool race, which means your bet goes into the same pool as millions of punters from Hong Kong, Britain, Ireland, and twenty-plus other countries. Deeper pools, steadier prices, and exotics that pay like exotics should.
Daryz is 7/4 to win it again, and he's been better this year than last. The catch: no colt has gone back-to-back since Alleged in 1978. Maltese Cross (5/1) is the best three-year-old in Europe but hasn't run in 46 days. Thundering On (10/1) is the Oaks winner, and fillies have won ten of the last eighteen. Varandir (10/1) won the Prix Niel, the best trial there is. Fifteen go, ground good.
My read: Daryz is the horse, Thundering On is the bet. Exacta those two, Varandir in the trifecta.
One more thing. The Arc goes off at 9:05 on Sunday morning, which means the correct way to watch it is slightly hungover from a French dinner the night before. Bar Bouchée in Madison is one of the best French restaurants on the East Coast and about twenty minutes from my couch. Book Saturday night, order whatever has butter in it, and when the waiter asks if you'd like to see the dessert menu, say "non, merci, I have the Arc at nine." They will understand. They're French. They've been waiting all year for someone to say it.
MORE RACING THIS WEEKEND
🏇 Santa Anita · Saturday and Sunday · first post 4pm ET. Three more tickets tomorrow. The American Pharoah (G1, $300K) is the West Coast's Juvenile qualifier, the Oak Leaf (G2, $200K) goes to the Juvenile Fillies, and the Rodeo Drive (G2, $200K) to the Filly & Mare Turf. The Chillingworth (G3) and Speakeasy support. Sunday adds the Zuma Beach (G3) and Surfer Girl (G3) for juveniles on turf. Santa Anita's Coast-to-Coast Pick 5 runs both days, and with a 4pm ET first post, the stakes land right as Keeneland and Belmont wrap up.
🏇 Woodbine · Saturday and Sunday · first post 1:05pm ET. Canadian International Day tomorrow. The Canadian International (G1, $750K, 1 1/2 miles) is the biggest turf race in Canada and usually draws a European or two. The Nearctic (G2, $250K) turf sprint, Algonquin (G3, $250K), and Dance Smartly (G2, $200K) support. Sunday it's the Cup & Saucer ($300K) for Canadian-bred juveniles.
🏇 Delaware Park · Saturday · first post 12:40pm ET. The whole Delaware Handicap card was washed out by the nor'easter last Saturday and moved to tomorrow, so it's the same four stakes a week late. The Delaware Handicap (G3, $500K) is a Dirt Dozen race for the Distaff, with the Battery Park ($200K), Rocky Run ($150K), and White Clay Creek ($150K) alongside. A $500K race at Delaware on the same afternoon as Keeneland and Belmont means the pool is softer than the purse deserves. Rob's Saturday guide covers all three tracks.
🐴 The Red Mile · Friday and Saturday · first post 1pm ET. Kentucky Futurity Day tomorrow: the 134th running, the oldest leg of the Trotting Triple Crown, alongside the Kentucky Filly Futurity and the Bluegrass three-year-old finals. Today the two-year-old Bluegrass finals go, $645K across two. Also tomorrow, the Dayton Pacing Derby (G1, $250K) in Ohio, and tonight the Indiana Sires Stakes at Hoosier Park from 6:15pm ET. 3% cashback on all of it.
🏇 Thistledown · Friday added card · first post 12:50pm ET. Thistledown added a make-up day for today after last week's weather. The Pick 6 carryover was $509,195 on Wednesday. If nobody hit it Thursday, it's live again this afternoon on a weekday card most people don't know exists. Check the lobby before first post.
🇬🇧 Newmarket · next Friday and Saturday, October 9 and 10 · first race 8:25am ET. The two-year-old championships: the Fillies' Mile (G1) Friday and the Dewhurst (G1, £500K) Saturday, the race that usually tells you who the 2,000 Guineas favorite is. The Cesarewitch (£175K) is the big handicap on the same card. Keeneland runs the Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup (G1, $750K) the same Saturday, and Charles Town stages its West Virginia Breeders' Classics night with nine stakes. Full preview next Friday.
🌏 Around the world, in three lines. Ka Ying Rising has now won 21 in a row in Hong Kong and is heading to Australia for The Everest, the richest turf race on the planet, later this month. Constitution Hill, the former champion hurdler, has been retrained as a flat horse by Nicky Henderson at nine years old and is being pointed at a Group 2 in Milan on October 25, which is the most Nicky Henderson thing that has ever happened. And Next, the dirt marathon king who won nine races beyond 1 3/8 miles by a combined 116 lengths, has been retired at eight. If you ever cashed a ticket on him, you know you never sweated the stretch.
🐕 Wheeling Downs + Tri-State · nightly, Tuesday to Sunday. Daily tip sheets for both in the Handicapping Store, and the Australian dogs take the overnight shift with 4% cashback.
🤑 LIVE CARRYOVERS
Carryovers are the best value in pari-mutuel betting. Thistledown Pick 6, $509,195 as of Wednesday, starts Race 3, and Thistledown is racing today on an added card. Churchill closed its meet Sunday with a mandatory Derby City 6 payout. Check Live Carryovers →
🏇 BREEDERS' CUP BINGO
Fifteen "Win and You're In" races in three days. That's never happened on one weekend before and it won't happen again this year. So we made a card.
Here's how it works. Pick a winner for every square. Reply to this email with your fifteen before first post at Keeneland today, 1pm ET, or send just the twelve Saturday and Sunday squares before noon ET tomorrow. Any full row of five winners gets you a "Better Luck Next Time" tee. Get all fifteen and we name a drink after you at Bobby V's Stamford, which has never happened and which I am fairly confident will not happen this weekend either.
Row one is the Keeneland row, mostly. Row two is Belmont. Row three is Santa Anita into Sunday. The Frizette and the Delaware Handicap are Dirt Dozen races, not Win and You're In, so they're not on the card, but bet them anyway. The full list with every field is in Rob's Win and You're In tracker.
My card, for the record: Zulu Kingdom in the Turf Mile, Coach Pope in the Futurity, Gaudreau in the Champagne, Classic Q in the First Lady (not a square, but I'm telling you anyway), and Praying to repeat in the TCA. The other ten I'll be guessing at like everyone else.
Bingo is for a shirt. But I have some exciting news. We have a real money contest coming soon. 🆕 Bobby V's Bradley is launching an in-venue handicapping contest, real buy-in, real prize pool, in the next few weeks. Consider this weekend your practice run. Details next Friday.
🏈 SPORTS THIS WEEK
🏈 NFL Week 4 · Sun Oct 4 1pm ET: Patriots @ Bills · Jets @ Bears 1pm ET · Cardinals @ Giants 1pm ET · Mon Oct 5 8:15pm ET: Falcons @ Saints
⚾ MLB Playoffs · Yankees swept the Red Sox in the Wild Card Series (9-0, 9-2) · ALDS Game 1: Yankees @ Rays, tomorrow 6:30pm ET · Big screens at Bobby V's Stamford
⚽ EPL · Back from the international break · Matchweek 6 this weekend
🥎 Jai Alai · Pelota Miami Season X · Pari-mutuel matches Tuesdays and Wednesdays, 11:30am ET · 3% cashback on exacta/trifecta at MyWinners
WHAT TO BET ON
🏈 NFL. All three of ours at 1pm ET again on Sunday. The Jets go to Chicago off the loss in Detroit, and I'd like to point out they covered nothing and Victor still won the bet, which is the kind of week it's been. The Patriots are at Buffalo, which is a divisional game at the new stadium against a Bills team that's been rolling, and the number will be big. The Giants host the Cardinals at MetLife, and Arizona is coming off a trip to San Francisco, so this is the most winnable of the three. Pick one. Don't pick all three. I say this every week and every week you pick all three.
⚾ Yankees. Two games, 18 runs scored, two allowed, Red Sox gone. The ALDS opens in Tampa tomorrow at 6:30pm ET, which lands right after the Keeneland Turf Mile and right before the Arc, so Saturday is going to be a long day. Bobby V's Stamford has it on every screen. Bet on sports at all of our nine venues in CT.
🏇 MY EXOTIC OF THE WEEK
I said if Forged Steel wired them I'd eat this newsletter. He didn't wire them, he stalked them, sat off :22.97 and :48.83 and took over on the far turn, and beat his stablemate Caldera by 1 1/4 lengths with Nevada Beach third at 6/5. The result is the same. See above for what I ate instead. So I'm 1-for-3 in the fall and I own two shirts about it.
This week: the Claiborne Breeders' Futurity at Keeneland tomorrow, the Juvenile qualifier. Six runners, three of them unbeaten off one maiden win each, which is a polite way of saying nobody knows anything yet. $1 trifecta key: Phone Booth on top, with Coach Pope, American History, and Q B Rocket underneath for second and third. Six combos, $6. Here's the logic. The three unbeaten horses have each won one race. Phone Booth has run second in a Grade 1 at Del Mar, which is a harder thing to do, and the Reddams don't ship to Kentucky for the scenery. The maiden winners will take the money, he'll be the price, and if he's as good as his last race says he is, this trifecta pays. Yes, my bingo square says Coach Pope. My bingo square is for a shirt. This is for money.
🏈 VIC'S PICKS: WEEK 4
Victor went 2-1 last week. Lions covered against my Jets (he laid 6.5, they won by 7, I have not recovered). Raiders beat the Saints outright at +3.5. Only the Bengals let him down, losing in Pittsburgh. That's the first winning week of the season, so naturally he's unbearable.
Victor filed this week's picks from an airport lounge somewhere between Portugal and Las Vegas, which tells you everything about the life of a man who went 2-1. Three picks:
👉 Bills -7 vs Patriots. Victor: "Is Brady jumping in from the booth? No? Fine, then Bills win in a romp, maybe a late Pats touchdown to keep us sweating a bit." Mike: that's two weeks running he's picked against one of ours. Last week the Jets lost by seven. I'm noticing a pattern and I don't like it.
👉 49ers -3 vs Broncos. Victor: "Can't wait to watch this one. Even an injury-riddled SF sneaks this one out."
👉 Jaguars +2.5 @ Bengals. Victor: "I really like this Jacksonville team and will take them to keep it very close in Cincinnati this week."
Victor's sign-off, verbatim: "Good luck. It's a minefield out there." He's in Vegas. He would know.
Hold him to his record. We're keeping score all season.
💰LIVE PROMOS THIS WEEK
Leon update. The sandwich board worked. The Futures pool closed Sunday and Leon has not taken the board off. He wore it to the pizza costume party, where it was briefly counted as a food costume and then disqualified on appeal, which may be the 100 we were short. He's now wearing it to the Yankees game. Here's what he's giving away: Bet & Get at Mountaineer + Finger Lakes · 3% cashback on all US & Canadian harness · 4% cashback on Australian greyhounds · 3% cashback on jai alai exacta/trifecta at Pelota Miami · Pelota Miami jersey giveaway, $2,500+ in jai alai bets wins a game-worn jersey.
🤦 WORST BEAT OF THE WEEK
New section. We've been running "Small stakes, big wins" for months and it's lovely and it's also not what anyone talks about at the bar. What people talk about is the beat. The Pick 6 that died in leg five. The nose. The horse that got scratched at the gate with your whole ticket keyed on it.
So, every week from now on: reply to this email with your worst beat from the weekend. Two sentences, the ticket, what happened. I pick the most painful one. That person gets a "Better Luck Next Time" tee and their beat printed here the following Friday, name withheld or not, your call.
To set the bar, two from last weekend that weren't mine. Every single person who had Shalom Hanover, seven-for-seven and the favorite, keyed on top of their Metro Pace exotics on Saturday night, and then watched him get scratched sick an hour before post. That's a beat. And anyone who had Banishing in the Lukas Classic. He was the one to beat. He finished last by 25 lengths. I wrote that paragraph. I'm sorry.
I'm not eligible. I already own two shirts.
Get in touch. I read every email. Over and out, and see you at the rail.
Mike B
VIP & Community, MyWinners
Tel: +1800 468 2260 (support)
P.S. Bobby V's Windsor Locks is hosting Survivor: Underground Games on Wednesday, October 14, on the big screen, because one of our regulars is on this season. We will not say who. We will say that if you've ever watched someone build a Pick 5 ticket at that venue, you've seen them under pressure before. Come watch.
P.P.S. Tonight's Mega Millions is $321 million. Tomorrow's Powerball is $440 million. That's $761 million across two draws, which would buy you the entire Fall Stars Weekend purse structure 120 times over. Tickets are available at all nine MyWinners venues. Think it, believe it, achieve it. As the motivational gurus say. I'm trying. Grab a ticket and try with me.
Frequently Asked Questions
There are fifteen Win and You're In races from Friday 2 October to Sunday 4 October. Keeneland's Fall Stars Weekend has eight. Belmont Park's Preview Day on Saturday has four, and Santa Anita has three. Every winner gets an automatic spot in the Breeders' Cup.
The Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe goes off at 9:05am ET on Sunday 4 October at Longchamp. It's a World Pool race, so your bet goes into the same pool as bettors in more than twenty countries. You can bet it on MyWinners.
The Breeders' Cup is at Keeneland on October 30 and 31. Any horse that wins a Keeneland prep this weekend gets to stay home for it.
The Coolmore Turf Mile (G1, $1.25M) on Saturday 3 October is the richest race of Fall Stars Weekend. It's a Breeders' Cup Mile qualifier with nine runners, and Zulu Kingdom is the one to beat for Chad Brown.
Thistledown's Pick 6 carryover stood at $509,195 as of Wednesday. Thistledown runs an added card today, Friday 2 October, with first post at 12:50pm ET. Check the Live Carryovers lobby in the MyWinners app before first post.
