January, 2021 | Horse Racing Free Tips

Nack Among Seven Voted Into National Sports Media Association Hall Of Fame

A record seven men have been voted into the National Sports Media Association Hall of Fame. They are sportscasters Bill King, Jim Nantz, and Dick Stockton, and sportswriters Larry Merchant, William Nack, William C. Rhoden, and Rick Telander.

In addition, NSMA members voted Mike “Doc” Emrick as the 2020 national sportscaster of the year, and Nicole Auerbach as the 2020 national sportswriter of the year.

Among the 108 who won 2020 state sportscaster or sportswriter of the year honors, 51 are first-time winners. They include two who passed away during the year: Detroit sports talk show host Jamie Samuelsen and 100-year-old Sid Hartman of the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

The NSMA will honor its winners and Hall of Fame inductees during the organization's 61st awards weekend, tentatively set for June 26-28, 2021, in Winston-Salem, N.C.

As the play-by-play voice of the San Francisco/Golden State Warriors, San Francisco Giants, University of California Golden Bears, Oakland/Los Angeles Raiders, and Oakland A's, King was on hand to broadcast some of the most famous sports moments in San Francisco Bay Area history. He had a signature beard, a signature call (“Holy Toledo”), and provided for many, the soundtrack of Bay Area sporting life. King died in 2005.

Nantz is a five-time winner of the NSMA's national sportscaster of the year award, a three-time Emmy winner, and a member of the Sports Broadcasting, Pro Football, and Naismith Basketball Halls of Fame. After stints at local television stations in Houston and Salt Lake City, Nantz moved to CBS in 2005 and has worked there ever since. Nantz is the network's lead play-by-play announcer for its coverage of the NFL, the PGA Tour, and the NCAA Basketball Tournament.

Like Nantz, Stockton is one of sportscasting's most versatile play-by-play announcers, with vast experience calling the NFL, Major League Baseball, and the NBA. Currently in his 27th year at FOX Sports, following 17 years at CBS, Stockton also has worked 19 years for Turner Sports. He began his career with local television sports jobs in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Boston.

Merchant may best be known as a boxing analyst with HBO Sports, but he began his career in the Army, as a sportswriter for the Stars and Stripes. After his discharge, Merchant wrote for the Wilmington (N.C.) News, where he became sports editor. From there it was on to the Associated Press before becoming sports editor and columnist at the Philadelphia Daily News. He then spent ten years as a New York Post general columnist. He joined HBO Sports as a boxing analyst in 1978, calling some of the sport's marquee fights, before retiring in 2012.

What Merchant was to boxing, Nack was to horse racing. He spent 11 years writing about sports, politics, and the environment at Newsday, before going to work at Sports Illustrated in 1978. He spent 24 years at SI, covering every big horse racing story and winning several awards. He also wrote three books, including Secretariat: The Making of a Champion. Nack died in 2018.

Rhoden spent 34 years as an award-winning columnist at the New York Times, with more than a decade spent as the author of its “Sports of the Times” column. In 2006, he wrote the book, Forty Million Dollar Slaves, He was a frequent panelist on ESPN's The Sports Reporters, and after retiring from the Times in 2016, he began as a writer-at-large for The Undefeated, ESPN's digital site that explores the intersections of race, sports, and culture.

Telander has spent the last 26 years as an award-winning sportswriter at the Chicago Sun-Times, where he is now the senior sports columnist. Prior to that, he was an award-winning special contributor, then a senior writer at Sports Illustrated. Also an author, Telander wrote the book, Heaven is a Playground, which in 2002, SI ranked #15 in its Top 100 Sports Books of All Time.

Emrick was voted National Sportscaster of the Year for the fourth time. The Michigan resident retired in the Fall after calling the Stanley Cup Finals for NBC Sports. The Hockey Hall of Famer had been calling the sport professionally since 1973.

At age 31, Auerbach is the youngest to win an NSMA national award in the organization's 61-year history. In her fourth year at The Athletic, she is one of its primary national college football writers. She also serves as a studio analyst for the Big Ten Network. Prior to The Athletic, she spent six years as a National College Sports Reporter at USA Today.

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Lukes Alley, Duke Of Mischief To Stand At Flowing Acres Farm At Fleetwood Lane In West Virginia

Flowing Acres Farm at Fleetwood Lane in Charles Town, W.V., will add Canadian champion Lukes Alley and Grade 2 winner Duke of Mischief to its roster for the 2021 breeding season, both standing for a private fee.

Lukes Alley will stand his debut season at stud in 2021, owned in partnership between Tampa-based Michael Ingrassia and Ocala-based Tom Foley of Foley Bloodstock. The 11-year-old son of Flower Alley won nine of 18 starts during his on-track career for earnings of $795,122.

He was named Canada's champion older male of 2014 on the strength of a campaign that included victories in the Grade 2 Autumn Stakes and G3 Durham Cup Stakes. However, his biggest showcase victory came two years later when he staged a hard-closing rally to win the G1 Gulfstream Park Turf Handicap.

A homebred in Ontario from the program of Eugene Melnyk, Lukes Alley is out of the stakes-winning A.P. Indy mare Vaulcluse, who set a track record for a mile and 40 yards at Tampa Bay Downs when she won the Suncoast Stakes. All six of her foals to race are winners, also including the Grade 3-placed stakes winner Arrifana.

Arrifana won five of six starts racing in Maryland and New York, and Ingrassia said he hoped the sibling's success would help clear the way for Lukes Alley in the minds of breeders in the Mid-Atlantic region.

Duke of Mischief, a 15-year-old son of Graeme Hall, comes to West Virginia after spending time at stud in Florida, Indiana, and Michigan.

Duke of Mischief won seven of 30 starts during his on-track career, and earned $1,905,747. He won the G2 Oaklawn Handicap, and picked up G3 triumphs in the Charles Town Classic Stakes, Ft. Lauderdale Stakes, and Philip H. Iselin Stakes. The horse is also stakes-placed on turf.

Bred in Florida by Marilyn McMaster, Duke of Mischief is out of the winning Real Courage mare My Lady Ameila, who is the dam of three winners from five foals to race. He is a half-brother to Grade 3 winner Lord Robyn.

From four crops of racing age and 48 starters, Duke of Mischief has sired 26 winners. Among them is Missduke it's True, who is a two-time champion in the Dominican Republic, and a two-time group stakes winner in that country. Domestically, his runners are led by seven-time winner Foolish Prince and four-time winner Sandy Mischief.

Lukes Alley and Duke of Mischief will join Hello Broadway and Lord of Greatness on the Flowing Acres Farm stallion roster, all standing for Ingrassia in whole or partnership.

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Golden Sixty Shooting For 12th Consecutive Hong Kong Win As He Prepares For G1 Stewards’ Cup

After his devastating win in last month's Group 1 Longines Hong Kong Mile, hometown hero Golden Sixty pleased his connections at Sha Tin this morning with a trial in typical fashion ahead of the G1 Stewards' Cup (1,600 meters) on Jan. 24.

“I'm happy with his trial, in the trial you can relax him – he doesn't show much, he never does,” trainer Francis Lui said.

The son of Medaglia d'Oro went through his first barrier trial of the new year under his own steam, traveling wide throughout before crossing the line fourth, while the Caspar Fownes-trained Southern Legend went home best in a time of 1:11.73 with stablemate Rise High just behind him.

Lui outlined the brilliant 5-year-old's program for the near future, including a potential step back up to 2,000 meters for the first time since his thrilling BMW Hong Kong Derby success last year in next month's G1 Citi Hong Kong Gold Cup, where he may square off with reigning Hong Kong Horse of the Year, Exultant.

“Stewards' Cup first and then maybe next month's Gold Cup,” Lui said, all but ruling out an overseas tilt this year: “Not this season (to going overseas) but that's another plan.”

The bay will seek back-to-back G1 victories in Sunday week's HK$12 million feature in what will be his fifth run this term as he shoots for his 12th consecutive win after surpassing the great Beauty Generation's 10 Hong Kong wins in a row last month.

“Sometimes you have to worry that he doesn't race too much, there aren't many races for him so he's fresh – Vincent (Ho) said he was a bit fresh this morning.” Lui said.

Lui was pleased with the Australian-bred's wellbeing and he remains buoyant of a positive result in 12 days' time.

“The way he has won his last few races – he can win,” Lui said.

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New Book Chronicles Life Of Sylvia Rideoutt Bishop, The First Black Female Trainer In America

A new book detailing life of Sylvia Rideoutt Bishop, the first Black female Thoroughbred trainer to be licensed in the United States, is now available from author Vicky Moon.

Bishop was one of 17 children born to a West Virginia family whose ancestors were enslaved. Sent to live with a nearby childless couple as a toddler, she was indulged with fancy dresses and one mesmerizing pony ride that changed her life. Her love of horses took her to the Charles Town racetrack at age fourteen to work as a groom, hot walker and then trainer, all the time fighting sexism and racial bigotry against a backdrop of the swirling Civil Rights movement.

She prevailed to break barriers, shatter stereotypes and celebrate countless transforming victories in the winner's circle with many wealthy clients. As a single mother after two failed marriages, financial reality forced her to take on extra work in the shipping department at a nearby Doubleday publishing factory. Never wavering in her passion, she returned to the track to train horses at age eighty. And finally, with little fanfare, she was honored for her pioneering accomplishments as the first black woman licensed to train racehorses in the United States.

This never-before-told story brings to life Sylvia's love of horses and demonstrates her resolve and grit in confronting a litany of obstacles. This included the limited opportunity for an education and the precarious odds of getting her fractious Thoroughbred racehorses to the starting gate when factoring in their health and soundness.

Sylvia' s clients included the late Tyson Gilpin, a Virginia native and former president of the Fasig-Tipton sales company. Their biggest victory came in The Iron Horse Mile at Shenandoah Downs on Sept. 4, 1962. Eddie Arcaro presented the trophy as Gilpin and his children gathered in the winner's circle.

Sylvia Rideoutt Bishop made her mark in the alluring sport of kings long before the tennis-playing Williams sisters or Olympic track star Jackie Joyner ever made the evening news. She traveled the half-mile track racing and fairground circuit in Cumberland, Timonium and Hagerstown Maryland, not far from Washington, D.C.

Sylvia Rideoutt Bishop Had A Way With Horses is available on Amazon and autographed hardback books with free postage are available on vickymoon.com.

Moon is a writer, editor and photographer. She has chronicled the lives of the famous and the not-so-famous, covered major crimes and prominent lives for People Magazine and The Washington Post. She writes a monthly life-in-the-Virginia-countryside column “Over the Moon” for Washington Life magazine. She has reported on hunt balls, steeplechase races, and parties from Palm Beach to Saratoga Springs for Town and Country and Millionaire magazines.

Moon has written about homes and gardens for Veranda and Southern Accents and served as a contributing editor for House and Garden. She appeared on the A&E network's “City Confidential” and served as a producer for Dominick Dunne's “Power, Privilege and Justice.” This is her tenth book, with many of her others involving horses and racing.

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