Hi there,
About last week. Four for four. Libertango, Sun Goddess, Hughes and Emphatic, the four I gave you for Breeders’ Cup Friday, all won, and a $1 win parlay on them paid $38.27. I would like to tell you it was handicapping. Some of it was. Then Saturday arrived, I had Forever Young in the Classic, and Sovereignty ran away from him the way he ran away from everyone this year. Horse of the Year, five Grade 1s, retired to stud on Monday. Bill Mott, 73 years old, won his first Classic since 2011 and looked like a man who had known all along.
So the scorecard reads 4-for-4 on Friday, humbled on Saturday, and I’ll take it, because the thing about this sport is it starts again on Friday. Which is today. Del Mar opens its fall meet this afternoon. Dubai opens its Carnival this morning. Flemington runs three Group 1s tonight while you sleep. And tomorrow at Belmont, Ted Noffey, the unbeaten champion two-year-old of last year, runs for the first time in 365 days. If you want to know what the Triple Crown trail lost when he got hurt, tomorrow at 3:12pm ET is your answer.
One more thing before the card. Richard counted the tickets this week: more than 12,000 winning tickets online, better than half a million dollars paid out, and higher prices at the dogs and the jai alai than at the ponies. You know who you are. More at the bottom.
Let’s get into it.
→ RACING THIS WEEK
- 🗓️ Today (Fri) · 🇦🇪 Meydan · Dubai Racing Carnival opens · from 8:30am ET · 🇺🇸 Del Mar · Bing Crosby season opener, Let It Ride Stakes 6pm ET · from 3:30pm ET · 🇺🇸 Meadowlands · harness · from 6:20pm ET · 🇦🇺 Flemington · Champions Stakes Day, three Group 1s, World Pool · from 8:40pm ET
- 🗓️ Tomorrow (Sat) · 🇺🇸 Belmont Park · $850K Stakes Saturday, Dwyer 3:12pm ET, Mother Goose 3:43pm ET · from 11:40am ET · 🇺🇸 Gulfstream Park · Juvenile Fillies Sprint · from 12:20pm ET · 🇺🇸 Churchill Downs · River City 4:25pm ET, Bet On Sunshine 5:25pm ET, $422K Pick 6 carryover · from 1pm ET · 🇨🇦 Woodbine · three graded stakes, C$525K · from 1:05pm ET · 🇺🇸 Del Mar · Chosen Vron Stakes · from 3:30pm ET
- 🗓️ Sunday · 🇺🇸 Gulfstream Park · Rainbow 6 mandatory payout, sequence from Race 5 at 2:22pm ET · 🇺🇸 Del Mar · Betty Grable Stakes · from 3:30pm ET · 🇺🇸 Los Alamitos · Super Derby, quarter horses, $642K · evening, about 9pm ET
- 🗓️ Next week · Thu: 🇺🇸 Dover Downs · Matron Stakes, three-year-olds (harness) · from 4:30pm ET · Fri Nov 13: 🇺🇸 Horseshoe Indianapolis · closing day · Sat Nov 14: 🇺🇸 Churchill Downs · Claiming Crown, nine races, $1.2M · 🇺🇸 Meadowlands · Fall Final Four, $2.6M (harness)
- 🗓️ Greyhounds 🐕 · 🇺🇸 Wheeling Downs · Wed to Sun, from 1pm ET · 🇺🇸 Tri-State · Tue to Sat, from 6pm ET · 🇦🇺 Australia · overnight, 4% cashback
→ TODAY, DEL MAR (from 3:30pm ET)
DEL MAR IS BACK FOR THIRTEEN DAYS, AND IT STARTS WITH A ROYAL ASCOT WINNER AGAINST A KENTUCKY DERBY HORSE.
The Bing Crosby meet runs Fridays to Sundays through Thanksgiving weekend, fifteen stakes, $2.1 million, and it ends with two Grade 1s on the turf. Today it opens with the Let It Ride Stakes ($100K, Race 6, about 6pm ET), a mile on the grass for three-year-olds, and the field is better than a $100K opener has any right to be. Jordi Bear (3/1, Rosario) was third in the Del Mar Derby over this course. Green Carrera (7/2, Rispoli) is a filly taking on the boys, and she won the Sandringham at Royal Ascot in June before finishing fourth in the Del Mar Oaks. And Pavlovian (12/1, Hernandez) beat Golden Tempo in the Louisiana Derby back in March, then finished last of eighteen in the Kentucky Derby, then went quiet. First time on turf. If you like a horse who has already beaten a Derby winner at 12/1, I won’t talk you out of it.
Eight races, and the weather in Del Mar is 72 and sunny, which is the main reason anyone has ever gone to Del Mar.
→ TONIGHT, FLEMINGTON (from 8:40pm ET)
THREE GROUP 1S IN THREE HOURS, AND THE HORSE WHO BEAT KA YING RISING GOES AGAIN.
Flemington closes its spring carnival the way it should, with three Group 1s on one card and World Pool on all of it. The Champions Sprint (11:50pm ET) has Tempted, who won The Everest three weeks ago by a head over Ka Ying Rising and has now won six in a row. She’s about 9/10 and running down the Flemington straight for the first time. The Champions Mile (12:30am ET) belongs to Autumn Glow on paper, Chris Waller’s filly, James McDonald up, barrier 2, nine runners, and the price will say so. The one to stay up for is the Champions Stakes (1:10am ET), a mile and a quarter, eleven runners, with Aeliana (about 2/1, Waller) and Cosmic Crusader (about 9/4), who beat her in the Turnbull and then won the Cox Plate. Sir Delius is 6/1 with blinkers on for the first time, and he’s the only horse who has ever beaten Autumn Glow. Bet it before bed. The card starts at 8:40pm ET, so there’s plenty you can do with your eyes open.
Tuesday, briefly. The Melbourne Cup went to Point Of Law, a three-year-old by Frankel, bred by King Charles, trained by John Gosden until a month ago and sold to Australia, where Ciaron Maher won the Cup with him by nearly four lengths and trained the second and third as well. First trainer trifecta in 166 years of the race. The favorite won the Melbourne Cup for the first time since 2013. Somewhere in Windsor, a man who sold him is not reading the results.
This morning, Dubai. The Dubai Racing Carnival opened at Meydan at 8:30am ET, sixteen meetings between now and World Cup night in March. If you’re reading this early enough, Midland Money, who won twice in the US for Bob Baffert, runs in the opener for his new UK trainer. If you’re not, the Carnival is on Fridays from here, and it’s at a very civilized hour.
→ SAT, BELMONT PARK (from 11:40am ET)
TED NOFFEY RUNS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN A YEAR, AND THE MOTHER GOOSE IS HALF AN HOUR LATER.
A year ago this week, Ted Noffey won the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and finished the season unbeaten, champion two-year-old, winter favorite for the Kentucky Derby. Then bone bruising, then nothing. No Derby, no Preakness, no Travers. Tomorrow he comes back in the Dwyer ($200K, Race 8, 3:12pm ET), a mile on the dirt, Pletcher, Velazquez, post 6, 8/5 on the morning line, twelve workouts since August. Todd says he looks phenomenal. Todd would. The horse he has to beat is Sea Strike (2/1, Prat, Chad Brown), who won the Curlin by eight and a quarter lengths in July and actually raced this summer. I have thoughts on that below.
Thirty-one minutes later, the Mother Goose (G2, $300K, Race 9, 3:43pm ET) for three-year-old fillies. Bodacious Bay (5/2) won the Cotillion by three and a quarter over the Kentucky Oaks winner, which is the best form in the race. Cognition (9/2, Prat) has run once, won by four at Keeneland, and Chad Brown won this last year with Fully Subscribed, who went on to run second in the Distaff last Saturday. The curiosity is Intrepids Fantasy (8/1), three for three at Delaware by a combined twenty-one lengths, first stakes, first time around one turn, first time without Lasix. Eleven go. The natural play is the Dwyer and Mother Goose as a double, and the bet-size version is a $1 exacta box in the Goose with the top two and the Delaware filly.
Earlier, the Pumpkin Pie ($175K, Race 6, 2:10pm ET), seven furlongs for fillies and mares, where Senza Parole is 3/5 off a 100 Beyer and still hasn’t won a stakes, and the Carle Place ($175K, Race 7, 2:41pm ET) for three-year-old sprinters on the inner turf. Rob’s Belmont preview has all four with posts. New Yorkers: this is a Saturday at your home track, from your couch, legally. Use it.
Bet Belmont Park on MyWinners →
→ SAT, CHURCHILL DOWNS (from 1pm ET)
A $422,000 PICK 6 CARRYOVER, CONNECTICUT ONLY, AND A HORSE CALLED GREENWICH VILLAGE.
Start with the money. The Churchill Downs Pick 6 has been building for two weeks and sits at $422,155 going into Saturday. Eleven races, first post 1pm ET, and two stakes inside the sequence. The River City (G3, $300K, Race 8, 4:25pm ET) is a mile and an eighth on the turf: Lambeth (9/5, Jose Ortiz) won the Sycamore and cuts back from a mile and a half, Ole Crazy Bone (3/1) won the Bowling Green and will be alone on the lead, and Teao (6/1, Saez) is the Chilean Horse of the Year making his US debut for Don Alberto. Then the Bet On Sunshine ($300K, Race 10, 5:25pm ET), six furlongs, thirteen sprinters, including Greenwich Village for Baffert, two stakes wins on turf, back on dirt off six months, worked three furlongs in 34 and change. I have no idea if he can run six furlongs on dirt. I do know a horse called Greenwich Village in a Connecticut-only pool is the kind of thing I’m contractually obliged to mention.
Free past performances for the whole card are in the Handicapping Store.
Bet Churchill Downs on MyWinners →
One horse, one bet, win only.
The bet: Sea Strike to win the Dwyer at Belmont, tomorrow, 3:12pm ET. $20. I know. Ted Noffey is the best two-year-old I saw last year and I’d like him to come back and win everything. But he is 8/5 off a 365-day layoff, a mile on the dirt, first time facing older-style three-year-old form, and the market is pricing the memory. Sea Strike won the Curlin by eight and a quarter in July, ran sixth in the Travers in August against the best of the crop, and has the fitness edge that a horse who hasn’t run since last November cannot have, however good the works look. At 2/1 or better, I’m betting the horse who has raced this year. If Ted Noffey wins anyway, I’ll be the happiest loser at the rail, and I’ll tell you so next Friday. Under 8/5 on Sea Strike, which can happen if the public gets nervous late, leave it.
→ MORE RACING THIS WEEKEND
- 🏇 Woodbine · tomorrow · from 1:05pm ET. Three Grade 3s in the last four races. The Maple Leaf (4:06pm ET) has Lupa at even money for Josie Carroll against Sultana, who won it last year, and Dixie Law, a three-year-old facing older for the first time. The Autumn (5:10pm ET) has William T going for three straight. The Bessarabian (5:42pm ET) has Reagan’s Flame (5/2) and Pondering, who won it at $27.90 last year. There’s a $5 All-Stakes Pick 3 across the three. The Majorette has moved to next Saturday.
- 🏇 Gulfstream Park · Sunday · Rainbow 6 mandatory payout. Nobody has hit it in nine days, the pool was estimated at $175,000 going into today, and on Sunday the whole thing pays out whatever happens. Sequence starts Race 5 at 2:22pm ET, the 20-cent cap comes off, most winners share the pool. Tomorrow’s card has the $75K Juvenile Fillies sprint and Ashima, a twelve-time winner, in the Time Passage.
- 🏇 Los Alamitos · Sunday night, about 9pm ET. The Super Derby (G1, $641,950), 400 yards, ten three-year-old quarter horses. Political Twist was the fastest qualifier in 19.57 seconds and is ten for thirteen. Beuteeful is trying to be the first filly to win it since 2019. Twenty seconds of racing for $640,000 is the best dollars-per-second ratio in the sport.
- 🏇 Del Mar · tomorrow and Sunday · from 3:30pm ET. The Chosen Vron ($100K) tomorrow for Cal-bred sprinters, with Lovesick Blues back on the West Coast, and the Betty Grable ($100K) Sunday for the fillies and mares.
- 🏇 Harness · The Meadowlands runs tonight and tomorrow from 6:20pm ET. The Ultimate Harness Pick 4 on Sunday mixes Rosecroft and Mohawk races on one 50-cent ticket. Thursday at Dover it’s the Matron for three-year-olds from 4:30pm ET. And next Saturday the Meadowlands runs the Fall Final Four, $2.6 million, the last big harness night of the year.
- 🐕 Wheeling Downs + Tri-State + Australia · Wheeling races Wednesday to Sunday from 1pm ET, Tri-State Tuesday to Saturday from 6pm ET, and the Australian dogs run overnight with 4% cashback. Rob’s Australian greyhound guide is still the best thing we’ve published on how to read them.
Bet This Weekend’s Racing on MyWinners →
→ THE GREENWICH CONNECTION
TWO BREEDERS’ CUP WINNERS LAST WEEKEND HAD A CONNECTICUT NAME ON THE PAPERWORK.
Peter Brant founded the Greenwich Polo Club in 1981, and for forty years his White Birch silks have been one of the great names in American racing. Last weekend, in partnership with Coolmore, he won two Breeders’ Cup races at Keeneland: Haffner in the Juvenile Turf on Friday, and Benvenuto Cellini in the $5 million Turf on Saturday, a horse Brant also bred, out of his own 2018 Breeders’ Cup winner Newspaperofrecord. Aidan O’Brien trains both, Ryan Moore rode both, and when Benvenuto Cellini quickened past Map of Stars inside the last furlong, O’Brien’s partner M.V. Magnier said of Brant, “this man can see around corners.” Benvenuto Cellini is entered in the Hong Kong Vase and Cup on December 13, which is a Saturday night in Connecticut and a race you’ll be able to bet from here. Consider yourselves warned.
Also for the Nutmeg file this week: a $50,000 Powerball lottery ticket sold at the Darien service plaza on I-95, another $50,000 Powerball in West Hartford, a $100,000 scratch ticket in Middletown. For the record, we’re headquartered in Connecticut and our venues are spread across the state, but our customers are all over the country, New York most recently. It feels like a lot of luck is parked in CT at the moment.
→ SPORTS THIS WEEK
- 🏈 NFL Week 9 · Sun Nov 8 1pm ET: Jets @ Chiefs · Giants @ Eagles 1pm ET · Packers @ Patriots 4:25pm ET · Bengals v Falcons in Madrid, 9:30am ET, so get your bets in early · Mon Nov 9 8:15pm ET: Bills @ Vikings
- 🏈 College · Sat Nov 7 · UConn v North Carolina, noon ET · Alabama @ LSU 3:30pm ET · Oregon @ Ohio State 3:30pm ET · No. 1 Miami @ Notre Dame 7:30pm ET
- 🏀 NBA · the Knicks are 4-4 after putting 135 on Chicago · Sat Nov 7 8pm ET at Cleveland · Tue Nov 10 7:30pm ET v Milwaukee
- ⚽ EPL · Sat Nov 7 12:30pm ET: Nottingham Forest v Man City · Sun Nov 8 9am ET: Sunderland v Chelsea · Crystal Palace v Liverpool 9am ET
At Bobby V’s this week
- 🏟️ Stamford and Windsor Locks. College football all day Saturday, Alabama-LSU and Oregon-Ohio State side by side at 3:30pm ET and Miami-Notre Dame at night. NFL Sunday from 1pm ET with the Jets and Giants in the early window and the Patriots late. Belmont and Churchill on the racing wall. Bet at the counter, both sides.
- 🎄 Christmas parties. December Saturdays at both Bobby V’s are going. A table of six or the whole room.
→ VIC’S PICKS: WEEK 9
Victor went 3-0 last week. Bills by 26, Broncos outright, Bears outright, and he’s now had two sweeps in the two weeks his camera didn’t work, which he has noticed. The camera is fixed. Three picks for Week 9, and one of them is against the Eagles, who have lost four in a row and are starting to look like a team that knows it. Watch his video.
- 👉 Bills -3 at Vikings (Mon 8:15pm ET). Vic: no way the Minnesota offense keeps pace with Josh Allen on the road.
- 👉 Cardinals +8 at Seahawks. Vic: Minshew Mania is back, at least for the first couple of weeks with a new team. Backdoor cover, Seattle still wins.
- 👉 Giants -3 at Eagles (Sun 1pm ET). Vic: the bell tolls for Philly, players could be held out ahead of more trades, and the Giants are poised to take a run at the division.
I’ll take the Giants one personally, as a Jets fan who has to watch my team at Arrowhead at the same time. Hold him to his record. We’re keeping score all season, and two sweeps in a row is the kind of thing that makes a man start a podcast.
→ LIVE PROMOS
Leon has been quiet on Slack this week, which in my experience means he is building something. Here’s what’s live while he builds:
👉 Bet & Get at Finger Lakes and Mountaineer. Two tracks, two separate totals, up to $60 back. Bet $150 and get $10, bet $300 and get $20, bet $500 and get $30, per track, not combined, so $500 at each is $30 from each. Every bet type counts except show. Finger Lakes runs afternoons from 1:10pm ET, Monday to Wednesday. Mountaineer runs nights from 5pm ET, Sunday to Wednesday. Get each track to a tier rather than leaving one short. [Bet Finger Lakes and Mountaineer →]
- 👉 3% cashback on all US and Canadian harness. With the Meadowlands running tonight and tomorrow and the Fall Final Four next Saturday, this is the one to use.
- 👉 4% cashback on Australian greyhounds, overnight, every night.
- 👉 3% cashback on jai alai exactas and trifectas at Pelota Miami.
- 👉 The Pelota Miami jersey. Bet $2,500 across the jai alai season and a player-worn jersey is yours. Two of you got there last week. Two jerseys went out. There are more.
Richard also tells me there are free-to-enter handicapping contests coming for the holidays, with a title involved. Track King. More on that when they let me say more.
→ FROM THE BLOG
Rob did the Breeders’ Cup and then kept going.
- 📰 Breeders’ Cup 2026 results: winners, payouts and how our tips went. All fourteen, every $2 payout, and the scorecard.
- 📰 Belmont Saturday preview: Mother Goose and Dwyer betting guide. Ted Noffey’s return, race by race.
- 📰 Triple Crown 2027: dates, venues, early contenders. Derby May 1. Hughes is the early name. Yes, already.
- 📰 Kentucky Derby futures: Pool 1 payouts and the road to Pool 2. Hughes closed at 8/1. You won’t see that again.
See you at the rail. Or at Belmont, 3:12pm ET, holding my breath. Hit reply and tell me who you’ve got in the Dwyer. I read every one.
Mike B
VIP & Community Manager MyWinners
Tel: +1800 468 2260 (support)
P.S. You did it again. More than 12,000 winning tickets online last week and better than $500,000 paid out across the ponies, the dogs and the jai alai, with the Breeders’ Cup and the Belmont card leading the way. The dogs and the jai alai paid the best prices, for anyone keeping notes. And one from the venues: a customer at Winners New Britain put $1 on a twelve-leg NFL parlay two Sundays ago, every leg a spread, and every one of them covered. $2,316.84 for a dollar. We never got his name. If that was you, come back and see us, there’s a Winners cap and a tee with your name on it, once we know your name.
P.P.S. Tonight’s Mega Millions is $505 million. Powerball was hit on Wednesday, $847 million on a single ticket at a Wegmans in Montvale, New Jersey, about forty minutes from Stamford, so tomorrow’s draw resets to $20 million. Tickets at all nine MyWinners venues, teller window or self-service machine.
P.P.P.S. Next Saturday is the Claiming Crown at Churchill, nine races and $1.2 million for the horses who do the actual work, and the Fall Final Four at the Meadowlands the same night. Tampa Bay Downs opens the Wednesday after. The season doesn’t slow down, it just moves south.
