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Santa Anita Kicks Off Friday’s Stronach 5 Wager

Turf races from Santa Anita Park and Gulfstream Park, two competitive maiden events, and a low 12-percent takeout highlight Friday's Stronach 5.

The popular wager will feature races from Santa Anita, Gulfstream, and Golden Gate Fields.

The sequence starts off at 4:33 ET with Santa Anita's third race, a $75,000 maiden event for 3-year-old fillies going six furlongs. The nine-horse field includes first-time starters from trainers John Sadler, Michael McCarthy and George Papaprodromou. Loma Vista makes her second start for trainer Philip D'Amato after a sixth-place finish on the turf against maiden special weight company in October.

The second leg of the sequence shifts to Gulfstream and the ninth race, an allowance optional claiming event at 5 ½ furlongs for fillies and mares. American of Course enters off a third-place finish against similar after a four-month layoff for trainer Kathleen O'Connell. Rakasa goes out first off a claim for trainer Aubrey Maragh who is 25-percent off a claim. Domineer also goes out first off a claim for trainer Jose D'Angelo, who is 31-percent off a claim.

Golden Gate's third race is next, a maiden event for fillies and mares at six furlongs with a field of nine going to post. Leading trainer Jonathan Wong sends out Feel This Moment, fifth in her debut Dec. 11. Here Comes Ralphie takes a drop in class for trainer Steve Sherman. The filly makes her first start since March and comes into the race off a 'bullet' work. Lady Skywalker gets blinkers on, Sugar Plum has blinkers off.

It's back to Santa Anita for Race 4, a 1 /8-mile turf event for $50,000 maiden claiming 4-year-olds and up. Nothngoodcomseasy goes out for trainer Doug O'Neill. The son of Medaglia d'Oro lacked room when finishing fifth by three lengths on the turf Nov. 7. Street Ruckus gets back on the turf where he finished fourth, beaten two lengths, in October. Vladimir Cerin trains. Hulk, 0-for-3 on the turf, gets John Velazquez in the saddle for trainer Jeff Mullins. World Cruiser goes out for trainer Eddie Truman after a second-place finish on the turf in November at Del Mar.

The Stronach 5 will conclude with Gulfstream's 10th race, a 1 1/16-mile turf event for 4-year-olds and up with a $35,000 claiming tag. The field of nine includes Alley Oop Johnny, who goes out first off the claim for trainer Mike Maker after a fourth-place finish on the turf Dec. 2 at Aqueduct. Stakes winner Archer Road goes second time out after a two-year layoff. Leading trainer Saffie Joseph Jr. sends out Hail to the Chief, third in his last two starts by less than two lengths against similar company. Stirling Drive will go out first time off the claim for trainer Dany Gargan after a third-place finish in November at Del Mar.

Friday's races and sequence

Leg One –Santa Anita Race 3: (9 entries, 6 furlongs) 4:33 ET, 1:33 PT
Leg Two –Gulfstream Race 9: (9 entries, 5 ½ furlongs) 4:42 ET, 1:32 PT
Leg Three –Golden Gate Race 3: (9 entries, 6 furlongs) 4:59 ET, 1:59 PT
Leg Four – Santa Anita Race 4: (8 entries, 1 1/8-mile turf) 5:04 ET, 2:04 PT
Leg Five –Gulfstream Race 10: (9 entries, 1 1/16-mile turf) 5:14 ET, 2:14 PT

Fans can watch and wager on the action at 1/ST.COM/BET as well as stream all the action in English and Spanish at LaurelPark.com, SantaAnita.com, GulfstreamPark.com, and GoldenGateFields.com.

The minimum wager on the multi-race, multi-track Stronach 5 is $1. If there are no tickets with five winners, the entire pool will be carried over to the next Friday.

If a change in racing surface is made after the wagering closes, each selection on any ticket will be considered a winning selection. If a betting interest is scratched, that selection will be substituted with the favorite in the win pool when wagering closes.

The Maryland Jockey Club serves as host of the Stronach 5.

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Taking Up For Bettors: Kentucky Rep. Koenig Seeks To Eliminate ‘Breakage’

Kentucky State Representative Adam Koenig is taking up the banner for the most-neglected component of horse racing: the bettors.

Koenig is co-chair, with Sen. Damon Thayer, of the Pari-Mutuel Wagering Taxation Task Force appointed to review taxation policies on gambling on the Commonwealth's horse-racing products. Koenig said on last Friday's Kentucky Racing Spotlight weekly radio show on Louisville's ESPN 680 that based on the task force's findings, he will introduce legislation for a flat 1.5-percent tax on the gross (before winning bettors are paid off) of pari-mutuel wagers, including the highly successful historical horse racing operations. Such a measure would substantially increase the tax on bets placed on Kentucky racing through online platforms, known as Advance Deposit Wagering (ADW).

Another provision Koenig is championing in the bill he plans to introduce during the current 2022 state legislative session: rounding payoffs down to the penny, rather than down to the dime on a $1 mutuel.

The practice of rounding down is known as breakage. It's a decades-old policy that allows racetracks and any licensed bet-taker, including ADWs, to keep the extra money, to the frustration of horseplayers who believe it should be returned to winning bettors.

“The thing I'm perhaps most excited about is the elimination of breakage on live racing,” Koenig told Kentucky Racing Spotlight hosts Joe Clabes and Jennie Rees on the show. “It's something that happens at every track everywhere. Win, place, show … they (pay off) – at least in Kentucky and most other states – to every 20 cents (on a $2 mutuel). You pay $3.20 or $3.40 or $3.80. But it doesn't work out that way. You might deserve $3.47 or $3.68. We're going to try to make that happen. Because it's your money and it goes back to – I don't know, the 1930 or 40s – when the only place you could gamble legally was the track. There were long, deep lines, and they didn't want to pay everybody to the penny every time they came up.”

If Koenig is successful, Kentucky would be the first state to essentially eliminate breakage. New York, with a sliding breakage calculation, is the only state in the last 30 years to address breakage, but the proposed plan for Kentucky is easily the most player-friendly of any, according to industry expert Pat Cummings of the Thoroughbred Idea Foundation.

“I think not only will it be great for the bettors, but I believe it will be an incentive for people across the country to bet on Kentucky racing,” said Koenig, an Erlanger resident whose district in Boone and Kenton County is adjacent to Turfway Park. “Maybe if you're a bettor like me who bets $5 to win, place on a race, it's not that big a deal. But if you're somebody who doesn't mind betting $200 across the board on a horse, that adds up to real money over time. I think the tracks will get the money back with additional wagering.”

“… I'm not doing it to cost the (tracks) money or even to help their product. I'm doing it because with the passage of this HHR (legislation) and increasing the numbers of HHR machines, we've taken care of the breeders, taken care of the owners; the trainers and jockeys are running for bigger purses,” Koenig continued, referencing legislation passed last February to protect historical horse racing. “The only person we haven't taken care of is the bettor. You can't run the show without all of those people — but you have to have the bettors.”

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The task force was convened in the wake of last year's passage of SB 120 that cleaned up the language to ensure that historical horse racing was legal under the Kentucky constitution. Some lawmakers felt HHR should be taxed at a higher rate, with more money going to the state's General Fund. Subsequent testimony documented that — by being taxed on the gross rather than on net revenue and with a mandated amount going toward purses for live racing — the excise tax on HHR is effectively 32.2 percent.

That places Kentucky's tax rate on the high end of surrounding states with casino gaming, testimony before the task force documented. While standardizing the 1.5-percent excise tax, Koenig's bill would increase the tax on online and phone wagers made in the state from 0.5 percent to 1.5 percent.

“There is a range of tax rates when you make a wager,” said Koenig, who continues to work on the language of the bill before filing. “… When you're at a track and you go to the window, go to a (self-bet) machine, there's a 1 1/2-percent tax on that. But if I am at Keeneland or Churchill Downs and I bet on a simulcast race, say Oaklawn, that's taxed at 3 percent. If I bet on that same race at Oaklawn on my phone, it's taxed at one-half of 1 percent. I'm sure these tax rates made sense when they were created. But now, they don't make so much sense.

“… I believe we're going to generate a fair amount of money, especially with raising the ADW tax from a half of a percent to 1 1/2 percent. It's very complicated because within those tax rates you're funding purses for thoroughbreds, for standardbreds, funding the University of Louisville (equine business) program. Funding pays for improvements at the track. It's more complicated than I ever thought. We're going to make it more even, so that it makes more sense, and we're going to generate some additional revenue for the General Fund.”

Koenig said his bill also will remove any restrictions on how Kentucky Thoroughbred Development Fund (KTDF) supplements can be used as long as recipient horses are foaled in the commonwealth and sired by a Kentucky stallion. The bill would leave it up to the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission's KTDF advisory committee to set the policy but would be expected to allow the Kentucky-bred supplements to be added onto claiming races for the first time.

Among other likely provisions:

Funding for the equine programs at the University of Kentucky and the Bluegrass Community & Technical College.

Requiring that the horse-racing industry pay for the cost of its regulation, with the budget for the racing commission currently coming out of the General Fund.

Creation of a revenue stream to provide help for problem gamblers. HHR facilities would be required to maintain and share self-exclusion lists, where problem gamblers who ask to join the list will be refused admission to such properties.

Kentucky's 2022 legislative session runs through April 14.

Kentucky Racing Spotlight, presented by the Kentucky HBPA, will run Fridays from 6-7 p.m. ET through March 4 on ESPN 680/105.7 with streaming at espnlouisville.com, the ESPN 680 app and the iHeart and TuneIn apps. The shows are archived at davisinnovation.com/kyracing. In addition to the Kentucky HBPA, Kentucky Racing Spotlight is sponsored by Davis Innovation, NKY Tribune and the Louisville Thoroughbred Society.

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Equibase Analysis: Thomas Shelby Could Get Perfect Trip In Oaklawn’s Fifth Season

Nine horses are entered in Saturday's $150,000 Fifth Season Stakes at Oaklawn Park, including the 2019 and 2021 winners of the Grade 2 Rebel Stakes, Long Range Toddy and Concert Tour, respectively. Long Range Toddy is winless in 16 races since then while Concert Tour, last seen finishing ninth of 10 in the G1 Preakness Stakes, returns from an eight month layoff and a change to the barn of Brad Cox.

Snapper Sinclair leads the field in career earnings at $1.8 million. He has run poorly in his last two races but one was his first ever try on an all-weather surface and the other was in the G1 Breeders' Cup Mile. Two races prior to that Snapper Sinclair won the TVG Stakes on the grass at Kentucky Downs. Rated R Superstar, who returns from four months off, is another who has had a fine career to date, earning $1.1 million, with his most recent win coming in the Governor's Cup Stakes in August.

Mucho enters the Fifth Season Stakes in superb form with six straight in-the-money finishes including a win in the Challedon Stakes last summer. However, Mucho is running in a two-turn race for the very first time after 29 races around one turn. Necker Island is another horse stretching out to two turns. He won the Bet On Sunshine Stakes in November as one of five wins in his career.

Thomas Shelby really likes to win races, with 10 victories in 24 career races. His most recent effort was a second place finish in the Tinsel Stakes at Oaklawn last month. Silver Prospector is approaching the $1 million mark in career earnings. After winning the G3 Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn in the winter of 2020, he has won just one of eight races. Atoka rounds out the field, entering the race off a runner-up effort in an allowance race over the track from which he was moved up to first after the winner was disqualified.

Top Contenders

Thomas Shelby draws the rail for this mile trip and that means jockey David Cohen will have the ability to put him on the lead, which has resulted in three wins in his last four starts, or settle him just off the pace, which has resulted in another three wins before that. Thomas Shelby joined the barn of trainer Robertino Diodoro in November of 2020 and after finishing fourth, third and seventh in his initial three starts for the barn, has turned into an “alpha” horse, winning seven of 10. Last October Thomas Shelby ran the best race of his career winning a classified allowance race with a personal-best 112 ™ Equibase Speed Figure. He won again in November, then after two months off led until deep stretch before coming up three-quarters of a length short in the Tinsel Stakes. That race was at Oaklawn and was run at a mile and one-eighth, with Thomas Shelby leading at the point this mile race ends so repeating that effort could be good enough to win the Fifth Season Stakes.

Silver Prospector has four career wins, one of which came at Oaklawn. That was when victorious in the 2020 Southwest Stakes with a then career-best 107 ™ figure. After a poor sixth place effort in the Rebel Stakes followed by a poorer seventh place finish in the Arkansas Derby, Silver Prospector was given nearly six months off. Returning in the fall off a lengthy layoff, Silver Prospector raced in top form to win and earned a very strong 106 figure considering the time off. Although winless in five races since, Silver Prospector ran just as well as he had in the comeback when second in the Razorback Stakes last February at Oaklawn, earning a 108 figure. Now rested since last May the same way he was in the spring of 2020 until his strong win in the fall of that year, Silver Prospector has put in a pair of very strong workouts which were the best of 52 and the fourth best of 44 on the day. These signal he could be as fit and ready to run just like he did off a similar layoff, and if he does that he could certainly compete for top honors in this race.

Concert Tour is another returning off a layoff since last May, and he too is working in the morning like he will not need a race before showing his best. Concert Tour won the first three races of his career last year, including the San Vicente Stakes and the Rebel, in which he earned a career-best 104 figure drawing off easily to win by four and one-quarter lengths in geared down fashion. After a third place finish in the Arkansas Derby¸ Concert Tour skipped the Kentucky Derby then showed up in the Preakness, running the worst race of his career when ninth of 10 and beaten more than 30 lengths. Returning to training last October, Concert Tour has been placed in the care of trainer Brad Cox, who has an exceptional record of nine wins from 25 starts with horses coming back from six months off or more in dirt routes. As such, Concert Tour appears to fit with the best of the contenders in this year's Fifth Season.

The rest of the field, with their best ™ Equibase Speed Figures, is Atoka (100), Long Range Toddy (102), Mucho (108 in sprint races), Necker Island (108 in sprint races), Rated R Superstar (105) and Snapper Sinclair (115 on turf).

Win contenders, in preference/probability order:
Thomas Shelby
Silver Prospector
Concert Tour

Fifth Season Stakes
Race 8 at Oaklawn
Saturday, January 15, 2022 – Post Time 4:46 PM E.T.
One Mile
Four Year Olds and Upward
Purse: $150,000

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Steve Wolfson Jr. Continues Family Tradition With High Rollers Contest Win At Tampa Bay Downs

Steve Wolfson Jr., and his father, Steve Wolfson Sr., had one of those afternoons Saturday at Tampa Bay Downs that horseplayers file away in their memory banks for a lifetime.

The high school social studies teacher and the long-time horseman made the three-hour drive from Ormond Beach on Florida's east coast to enjoy an afternoon of racing at Tampa Bay Downs in Oldsmar and, not coincidentally for Steve Jr., to compete in the High Rollers Handicapping Contest Presented by HorseTourneys.

“We haven't traveled much the last couple of years because of COVID,” said the younger Wolfson, “so it was a chance enjoy great racing, and it was a glorious day to be outdoors. It never gets old, but it's best when it's shared.”

And by coming home with the top prize of $23,000, plus his final contest bankroll of $1,779.20, Wolfson Jr., couldn't have had a more fulfilling day. “It was a wonderful time with the person who introduced me to racing,” he said. “It was a really good ride over, and better coming back.”

Both Wolfson Jr., and second-place finisher John Kaiser of Krotz Springs, La., qualified for the National Thoroughbred Racing Association/National Handicapping Championship from Jan. 28-30 at Bally's Las Vegas. Kaiser's final bankroll was $1,690, and he earned an additional $9,200 for finishing second (top-10 below).

Individuals who play handicapping contests are rarely lacking for confidence, but many in the field of 112 players with an appreciation for the challenge involved were respectful – if not fearful – of the Wolfson name. Steve Jr., and his dad, who did not compete, are members of the National Handicapping Championship (NHC) Hall of Fame.

Wolfson Jr., won the 2001 NHC Championship at Bally's Las Vegas, collecting a cool $100,000, while his father finished fourth. In 2017 at Treasure Island in Las Vegas, the younger Wolfson finished second, earning $250,000.

Wolfson Sr., had put on some handicapping tournaments in the 1990s that were the forerunner of the NHC events, setting the standard for subsequent contests in terms of player hospitality and amenities. Wolfson, Jr., praised Saturday's Tampa Bay Downs event as a first-class production, with all the intensity, camaraderie and ups and downs serious players thrive on.

“Whenever you bring people together like that, there is so much energy flowing that it's tremendous fun. It's just nice to have people there in person sharing the excitement and not at home behind their computers,” Wolfson Jr., said.

The High Rollers champion comes by his love of racing, and his knowledge of handicapping, through vast experience around Thoroughbreds. Wolfson Sr., and his brother, the late Gary Wolfson, were prominent Florida breeders and owners who owned 497-acre Happy Valley Farm in Marion County, and young Steve often traveled with them to major racetracks for big races throughout the country. Another uncle, Marty Wolfson, was a successful trainer from 1972-'18.

Going back another generation, Wolfson's grandfather, the late Louis Wolfson, owned Harbor View Farm, which bred and owned 1978 Triple Crown winner and two-time Horse of the Year Affirmed. Young Steve attended the 1978 Kentucky Derby as a 10-year-old and the 1978 Belmont Stakes nine days after turning 11, wondering like so many others how the heck 18-year-old jockey Steve Cauthen did it.

“That was a wonderful introduction to the highs of horse racing. It has been in my blood a long time,” Wolfson said.

In Saturday's contest, Wolfson displayed his bona fides in the fourth race, placing $100 of his bankroll to win on Dos Vaqueros. “It was such a weak condition (horses 4-years-old-and-upward who had never won two races, sprinting six furlongs for a claiming price of $8,000), and he showed a bullet workout and a five-furlong workout in (1:00 1/5). It seemed like that was enough,” Wolfson said.

It was, but hardly anyone else followed suit, both in the contest room and elsewhere. Dos Vaqueros, 5-1 on the morning line, paid $24 to win.

Wolfson managed his bankroll judiciously after that big score, and his $60 win wager in the ninth race on Cajun Casanova, who paid $5.80 to win, clinched the top position.

John Kaiser staged a whirlwind rally to finish second, hitting the last three races on the card at $100 to win a pop. He will be making his seventh appearance at the NTRA/NHC and hoping to cash big for the first time.

“I didn't have that early long shot, so I had to stay patient,” Kaiser said. “I didn't want to reach too far, and I was able to stay consistent.” He won four of his five wagers on the day, with his score on first-time starter In the Union, a Todd Pletcher-trained colt who paid $13.60 to win in the eighth race, fueling his comeback.

“The atmosphere was excellent and having HorseTourneys step up to sponsor the tournament was really nice,” Kaiser said. “I really enjoyed it, and the people who ran the contest did a great job.”

Here are the top-10 finishers, along with their final bankroll figures and additional earnings in parentheses:

Steve Wolfson, Jr., $1,779.20 ($23,000); John Kaiser, $1,690 ($9,200); Evan Trommer, $1,590 ($6,900); Jose Giron, $1,356 ($4,600); H. Vincent Griffo, $1,200 ($2,300); Edward Enbong, $1,180; Andy Muhlada, $1,145; Brody Wolfgram, $1,070; Andrew Hennosy, $1,010; Henry Gruss, $1,000.

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