- Hey, hope everyone is having a nice New Year's Day and Night, and that the bowl games are turning out to your liking.
Walter mentioned the fifth at Santa Anita and Baffert's first-timer Painted Shadow, at 4-5, the so-called fastest horse in the world. I keep checking out the Santa Anita races and then reaching for the remote to switch to TVG before I remember that they don't carry it.
Well, I'm certainly enough of a degenerate that I can watch the tote, bet the race without seeing any of the horses, and wait around 20 minutes or so before it pops up on Cal Racing. So I was checking out the fifth, though in this case I didn't wager. Painted Shadow is a modestly-bred Forest Camp colt who showed the quick five and six furlong works that you often see from this barn.
And I saw the race the same way Walter did; Garrett Gomez, riding the favorite, seemed to be working harder on the turn than was Tyler Baze on the winner, and I too thought he would tire. He ran greenly in the stretch, but leveled out nearing the wire and closed well in missing by a neck in a respectable final quarter of 12.98 seconds. I'm sure he'll be lower than 4-5 next time.
I lost on the Tropical Park Derby. I really did like the winner and 3-2 favorite Soldier's Dancer I must say, but figured he'd be bet down and picked Rutledge Cat based on his 6-1 morning line. The latter went off at 7-2, and I ended up betting the two of them on top, trying to score with the 14-1 Loose Leaf underneath, but he had nothing. Second place finisher Sedgefield is a half brother to English Channel; he got bet early but drifted up to 11-1.
- Anyone have Boise State plus 7 1/2?
[EDIT 10:01 EST - Uh oh..]
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Monday, January 01, 2007
Checking In
Posted by Alan Mann at 5:51 PM
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5 Comments:
I wouldn't call a final furlong in 13 seconds "respectable". As i mentioned, i consider it rather slow. I think you can cut the two horses some slack however, based on the fact they were really cooking early, and figured to get a little tired. I might also mention that the winner (Can This Be True) is the second horse coming out of that Taxi Fleet race to win (2nd place finisher Tenfold returned to win on Opening Day). Keep your eye on Taxi Fleet when he resurfaces.
As for the Bowl games, my big play is on the LSU Tigers in the Sugar Bowl on Wednesday night. I took -8 when the lines first came out about a month ago, and right now it's either 9 or 9.5 depending where you look. Appears certain to hit 10 by gametime. LSU is playing as well as any team in the country right now, and faces a Notre Dame team that got smoked by the only other top-level teams they've met this year (Michigan and USC). Throw in the fact that this is basically a home game for the Tigers, with the game being played in the Superdome. LSU should handle Notre Dame pretty easily, i think.
One of the best bowl games ever. BSU I got them +7, a scary one but what an unbelieveable game. If they had lost I would have been very disappointed win, push, or lose for me. What an unbelieveable game.
And here's to a great 2007 year in racing.
I'm not a big college football fan, but I couldn't turn off that one. Wow! I can't believe they went for the two point conversion!
And a happy and healthy New Year to you, Alan, and your readers. I am a recent convert to the blog scene and have found LATG to be a fun and informative site and look forward to lots of good discussions in 2007.
On the NY franchise front, I noticed that the Ad Hoc Committee site is no longer. Without the web-site, how will the proposals be made public?
It also raises the question whether there will actually be a report or an audience for it since the change in governorship (who gets the report -George or Eliot?). Mr. Spitzer's recently reiterated his comments that the RFP process was flawed due to scoring integrity at 20% ("either you have it or you don't"). Plus there now seems to be some concern that 20 years may be too long to commit the franchise for.
>>On the NY franchise front, I noticed that the Ad Hoc Committee site is no longer. Without the web-site, how will the proposals be made public?
It was there the other day. I guess their funding really did run out on 12/31. Robert Williams wrote me that he'd send me a copy of the report once it is issued; so I guess they'll do it through the press.
I don't know if any of the groups are ethical enough for Spitzer at this point. My main concern about the 20 years is that if you have public companies involved, things can change drastically over that time period. If the industry consolidates, those 6% stakes in Empire can become 12 - 18 - 24% or more. My concern is that an operator with only minimal interest in racing could get a controlling stake.
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