Emerald Downs - Week 1 Recap

Well, not a stellar weekend for myself, but it appears the meet kicked off in fine fashion. There was nice weather and there appeared to be a decent crowd. Not sure what the overall handle was relative to last year (especially the live-on-live handle), but people seemed to be in relatively good spirits. Just time for a few observations from the first weekend at Emerald Downs: 

(1) Headphone Giveaway - Was I the only one disappointed that Don Munger didn't win Beats by Dre headphones this weekend?

(2) Jerre to Carrie - Very impressive winning the feature race on Saturday. I didn't pick her to win before the race but once she walked into the paddock I quickly changed my mind. She looked spectacular and had filled out very nicely since last year. Just shows you how much these horses can change from their two-year-old to three-year-old year. Her sire, Congrats, has been on fire this year. More to follow on her pedigree in a future post.

(3) OB Harbor - Owned by Princess Pigtails, Jody Peetz, OB Harbor rocketed to an impressive victory on Sunday stopping the clock in 100.97 for 5.5 Furlongs. Fractional times for the race

21.60 

43.75 

55.02 

100.97 

The next fastest 5.5 Furlong time of the weekend was set by Thisdewarsforyou who ran it in 101.92. 

What is amazing is that this trainer and owner can almost set a world record for 5.5 Furlongs but can't operate a basic Emerald Downs television in the Owners' Box. Actually, they couldn't even figure out how to turn the TV on. It took several tutorials by yours truly before these two could figure out how to operate a basic things like volume and channel changing and I am still not convinced they know how to do it. Next weekend I am going to teach them how to use an Atari gaming system. The joystick may be a little technical for them. 

By the way, they were surprised to learn they time races in tenths of a second because they are still using a sundial to time workouts. Eventually I will tell them what a Swatch watch is.  

(4) Emerald123 - Started a friendly Emerald123 contest with two other people and I am already in last. To add insult to injury Emerald 123 had to remind me of something I already know: 

Yah, I know I don't have any friends yet. 

(5) Pick 7 ("Withee Wager") - Now this wager gets interesting with a $6,400 plus carryover going into Saturday. Serious investors realize that we can beat the takeout rate with the carryover and only a 16.1% takeout on all new money coming in. Anyone interested in syndicating a ticket should email me privately. 

(6) El Dorado and Abraaj both had a solid weekend with wins by Classic Grand, Exit Sixty Slew (30-1) and a very good second by Kaabraaj in the feature race on Sunday. Abraaj continues to impress me as a sire and I expect he will get a full book of mares this season (in Washington, 30 is a full book to me). More to follow on this sire in future posts. 

More to follow when I have more time to write some pedigree analysis about our winners last weekend. 

Always Love Your Animals, 

Will