September, 2022 | Horse Racing Free Tips

Eldar Eldarov Wins St. Leger At Doncaster; Saturday’s Card Follows Two Minutes Of Silence To Honor Queen Elizabeth

The world's oldest classic, the Cazoo St. Leger (G1) at Doncaster, went to Eldar Eldarov, who captured the rescheduled race Sunday after a 24-hour delay out of respect to Queen Elizabeth II, who died Thursday.

Observing a two-minute silence before the day's racing started to honor the Queen, who was a longtime patron of horse racing, jockeys and trainers bowed their heads prior to the Great Britain's national anthem.

Jockey David Egan was aboard Eldar Eldarov, a 3-year-old son of Dubawi, who won by two lengths from Haskoy while 11-8 favorite New London finished another half length back in third in the nine-horse field.

Egan had Eldar Eldarov ideally positioned in midfield, and although he was slightly hampered over two furlongs out, he advanced down the center of the track before grabbing the lead inside the final furlong, drawing well clear with 100 yards to run to seal the victory.

Haskoy was later demoted to fourth, while New London, also by Darley sire Dubawi, was promoted to second.

A lightly raced colt, Eldar Eldarov has now won four from five starts, including the Queen's Vase (G2), in which he became Dubawi's 150th individual group winner, in June at Royal Ascot.

Owned by KHK Racing Ltd. and trained by Roger Varian, Eldar Eldarov's final time for the 1¾ miles and 132 yards was 3:08.39 on turf rated as good to soft.

Varian won the St. Leger for a second time after taking the 2014 edition with Kingston Hill.

Eldar Eldarov was bred by Kirsten Rausing and is the third foal out of the stakes-winning Sea The Stars mare All At Sea.

The post Eldar Eldarov Wins St. Leger At Doncaster; Saturday’s Card Follows Two Minutes Of Silence To Honor Queen Elizabeth appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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Texas Holdem Strategies

The subject of this article is basic Texas Holdem strategy; the common sense guidelines to smart poker that you’d better know well, because your opponents sure do, and they’re using it against you right now. Here we go!

Fold
Forget about what you see on TV. In real Texas Holdem you will be folding more often than anything else. And if you’re not, then you’re probably playing too frivolously. Texas Holdem is about seizing opportunities, not barnstorming through every hand. If you stay in to the Showdown on more hands than you fold, we wager that your time as a Texas Holdem player will be brief.

Check
Overzealous poker neophytes will often fold out of a hand they could just as well have stayed in, if only they’d waited to see if everyone checked before them. Often everyone will check in a hand, and then you — having folded instead because you thought your hand unsalvageable — missed out on a chance to see your next card for free. Oops. If you’re the first to bet and you want to fold, check instead (unless you plan to bluff and then, may the force be with you). Worst case scenario, someone bets after you and then you fold after all. Big deal.

The Nuts
This is when you have the best possible Texas Holdem hand that can be had at the table at that given moment in time. If you’re not sure whether you have the nuts or not, you probably don’t. And if the River hasn’t been dealt yet, the subsequent card or cards in the deal could totally alter what The Nuts becomes.

Slow Play
A passive strategy, whereby you, holding a winning hand, feign weakness to keep more players contributing to the pot. If, after pulling off a slow play to the end, you still believe you have the winning hand, you may want to go all in on the River.

Check-Raise
A deceptive strategy whereby you, holding a strong Texas Holdem hand, initially feign weakness by checking the right to bet to the next players; then, when a player does bet and your turn comes around again, you don’t just call the bet, but your raise it (and usually raise it big). With this strategy, even if all players fold at that moment, you still get the chips they threw in after you checked.

Keep Your Emotions at the Door
They will kill you at the Texas Holdem table. You must keep your wits about you, and if you can’t — as will sometimes be the case — get out of the game and get out while you still can.

Change It Up
Whatever your personal favorite strategies, to be truly successful at Texas Holdem, you must mix up your game. Don’t let yourself fall into a rut, and by all means, do not become predictable — it is Texas Holdem’s kiss of death. Keep your opponents guessing, or suffer the consequences.

Position
Consider where you’re sitting in the sequence of betting for each hand. Your strategy must change depending on whether you’re betting first, last, or somewhere in the middle.

Attack Weakness
Texas Holdem players are either predators or prey. And if it’s often very difficult to tell one from the other. So proceed with caution, and when you smell fear, pounce!

Chip Leaders
There is one way, and one way only, to play Texas Holdem when you are the chip leader: as a Bully. When you have the most chips, it is your prime opportunity to wipe out as many players from the game as you can. All of them. That is your best chance to win.

Cave Rock Rolls in Runhappy Del Mar Futurity

Made the 2-5 jolly to follow up on a giant, 'TDN Rising Star'-worthy debut, for which he earned a towering 101 Beyer Speed Figure, Watson, Weitman and Pegram's Cave Rock (Arrogate) made it a sweep of the weekend main-track juvenile Grade Is for his late sire and gave trainer Bob Baffert an unprecedented 16th victory in the GI Runhappy Del Mar Futurity.

Having graduated by a half-dozen lengths on his Aug. 13 debut, the $210,000 Keeneland November weanling and $550,000 Keeneland September yearling was squeezed back between fellow 'Rising Star' stablemate Newgate (Into Mischief) to his inside and the commonly owned GIII Best Pal S. hero Havnameltdown (Uncaptured) to his outside, but he easily made up the length or so he'd lost to shade Havnameltdown for the lead through a quarter that was posted in a strong :21.56. Dueling heads apart around the turn as the pace remained breakneck, Cave Rock and Havnameltdown pulled well clear of the remainder as they hit the stretch, but the former found extra–particularly when switching his leads at the eighth pole–and went on to score by an imposing margin before galloping out strongly. Skinner (Curlin) picked up the pieces for third. The final time of 1:20.99 for the seven furlongs breaks the previous stakes record of 1:21.29 set by future champion Declan's Moon (Malibu Moon) set in 2004.

“He's a good horse; very professional,” said jockey Juan Hernandez, winning his meet-leading 12th stakes event. “And he's fast. He broke a step slow, but then he got right in gear and made the running. I tried to slow him down some, but he wasn't having it. So I just let him go on and do his thing. When we hit the quarter pole, I asked him and he changed leads and took off. He just wanted to go. He's something.”

Pedigree Notes:

Cave Rock is the third graded winner–all Grade I winners–and the sixth black-type winner overall for the much-missed Arrogate. Like Saturday's GI TVG Del Mar Debutante heroine And Tell Me Nolies, Cave Rock was prepared for his first trip through the sales ring by Mulholland Springs, and like the Debutante victress, the colt also hails from a Danzig-line dam. Danzig also appears on the bottom side of the pedigree of Arrogate's other black-type placegetters Catiche and Caragate.

Cave Rock's yearling full-brother topped this year's Fasig-Tipton New York-Bred Sale on a bid of $700,000 from Tom McCrocklin, agent for Champion Equine, and 2011 GIII Schuylerville S. winner Georgie's Angel produced an Improbable filly this year before being bred back to Connect.

Sunday, Del Mar
RUNHAPPY DEL MAR FUTURITY-GI, $302,000, Del Mar, 9-11, 2yo, 7f, 1:20.99 (NSR), ft.
1–CAVE ROCK, 120, c, 2, by Arrogate
1st Dam: Georgie's Angel (GSW, $129,564), by Bellamy Road
2nd Dam: Lalka, by Dynaformer
3rd Dam: Celmis, by Bold Ruckus
'TDN Rising Star' 1ST BLACK-TYPE WIN, 1ST GRADED STAKES WIN, 1ST GRADE I WIN. ($210,000 Wlg '20 KEENOV; $550,000 Ylg '21 KEESEP). O-Michael E Pegram, Karl Watson & Paul Weitman; B-Anne & Ronnie Sheffer Racing LLC (KY); T-Bob Baffert; J-Juan J Hernandez. $180,000. Lifetime Record: 2-2-0-0, $228,000. Click for the free Equineline.com catalogue-style pedigree. Werk Nick Rating: First SW this cross. Click for the eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.
2–Havnameltdown, 123, c, 2, Uncaptured–Ashley's Babe, by Put It Back. 1ST G1 BLACK-TYPE. ($16,000 Ylg '21 OBSOCT; $200,000 2yo '22 OBSAPR). O-Michael E Pegram, Karl Watson & Paul Weitman; B-Katherine S Devall (FL); T-Bob Baffert. $60,000.
3–Skinner, 118, c, 2, Curlin–Winding Way, by Malibu Moon. 1ST BLACK-TYPE, 1ST GRADED BLACK-TYPE, 1ST G1 BLACK-TYPE. ($40,000 Ylg '21 KEESEP; $510,000 2yo '22 OBSAPR). O-C R K Stable LLC; B-Stonestreet Thoroughbred Holdings LLC (KY); T-John A Shirreffs. $36,000.
Margins: 5 1/4, 4 1/4, 1. Odds: 0.40, 6.50, 13.50.
Also Ran: Newgate, The Big Wam, Mixto, Classical Cat, Agency, Pop d'Oro. Click for the Equibase.com chart and the TJCIS.com PPs. VIDEO, sponsored by TVG.

The post Cave Rock Rolls in Runhappy Del Mar Futurity appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Baffert-Trained 2YO Speed Boat Beach Streaks To Track Record-Setting Win In Career Debut At Del Mar

Pegram, Watson, and Weitman's Speed Boat Beach sped to a track record in his racing debut Saturday at Del Mar when he covered 5 1/2 furlongs in 1:01.86.

Trained by Hall of Famer Bob Baffert, the Bayern colt out of the Pioneerof the Nile mare Sophia Mia took the lead out of the gate in the maiden special weight race for 2-year-olds and was never headed under Flavien Prat. He set fractions of :21.34, :44.17, and :55.96 en route to a 1 1/4 -length triumph.

The previous track record of 1:02.10 was set by Power Jam, also trained by Baffert, in the 2016 Pirate's Bounty Stakes.

Baffert also trained Speed Boat Beach's sire and broodmare sire. His dam was unraced.

Earlier this year, Speed Boat Beach fetched $200,000 from Three Amigos (Mike Pegram, Karl Watson, and Paul Weitman) at the Ocala Breeders' Sales Co. March Two-Year-Olds in Training Sale. Finishing behind him Saturday were two other Baffert trainees: Zedan Racing Stables' runner-up Hejazi (a $3.5 million purchase at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Two-Year-Olds in Training sale) and co-breeder SF Racing and partners' third-place finisher Fort Bragg (a $700,000 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky Fall Yearling Sale purchase in 2021).

Baffert had put 10 works into Speed Boat Beach at Los Alamitos and Del Mar prior to his Saturday start, including a handy :58.60 five-furlong drill out of the gate on Sept. 3 at Del Mar.

Baffert's track record-setting win Saturday with Speed Boat Beach was his 10th 2-year-old maiden special weight victory of the meet. He also won the 2-year-old Best Pal Stakes with Havnameltdown.

Speed Boat Beach was bred in Florida by Caperlane Farm. He returned $6.40 for the win.

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