A lot of All-Optional Live (“AOL”) tourneys are coming your way this Saturday and Sunday. In those you make your 10 plays from 25 eligible contest races. But on Friday, you can “dial up” five featured Pick & Prays.
Three of those take place right here at HorseTourneys, led by our Friday, up-to-$15,000 Pick & Pray with $7,500 Guaranteed. The entry fee is $190. Last Friday’s pot was a plenty-solid $14,297.
The Horse Player World Series is just a month away and you can pick up a $1,500 entry to it in Friday’s Pick & Pray qualifier. One of every 20 entries, at $89 per entry, will be headed to The Orleans on March 26-28.
Time is drawing even shorter to qualify for the February 29-March 1 Flo-Cal Faceoff. That’s our $100,000 Guaranteed online event featuring full-card action both days from Gulfstream and Santa Anita. When next weekend rolls around, it will cost you $1,500 to buy in to the Faceoff…but you can win a spot in it for $86 in Friday’s Pick & Pray qualifier.
Two popular Pick & Prays are on the Friday schedule at HorsePlayers.
Qualifying is already underway for the 2021 NHC, and you can add your name to the roster of early qualifiers in Friday’s $75 Pick & Pray with two seats guaranteed.
A $10,000 Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge entry will be on the line in Friday’s Low Ratio Pick & Pray with a winning ratio of 1 per 23. It’s $500 to enter.
Contest races for the Friday featured action are the 6th through 10th at Gulfstream, the 7th through 9th from Tampa; and the 1st and 3rd from Santa Anita—10 races in all.
Four All-Optional Live events are among the six featured competitions at HorseTourneys and HorsePlayers on Saturday.
We’ll start with the four “AOL” games (all right here at HorseTourneys). In these, you make 10 mythical $2 win and place picks from among 25 eligible races at your disposal. If you hate a race, or think it will come up chalky, just skip it and wait for a more promising race later.
The All-Optional Live format will be in play for the weekend’s richest game: Saturday’s up-to-$30,000 tourney with $15.000 Guaranteed. It’s $260 to enter.
The same format will determine the outcome in our qualifier to the March 7 Gotham Challenge at Aqueduct. This 1-per-10 game offers $500 entries to The Big A. It’s just $59 to take part on Saturday.
Every weekend day is an HPWS day at this time of year. Pick the right 10 races in our Horse Player World Series qualifier, and you’ll earn not just a $1,500 entry to the “March Major” in Vegas, but a four-night hotel stay at The Orleans, and a $500 travel credit. The entry fee here is $148, and the winning ratio is 1-per-20.
We also have an All Optional Live qualifier on Saturday to the April 19 Keeneland Grade One Gamble. It’s $236 to play, and one in 20 will earn a $4,000 package to the “Gamble,” where players will compete for a robust prize pool containing cash, NHC seats and BCBC entries.
There is one traditional, 12-race Pick & Pray at HorseTourneys on Saturday, and it’s a good one—a “regular” NHC qualifier ($165 entry fee) with two spots guaranteed.
There’s a more traditional 12-race tourney (this one a live-format game) over at HorsePlayers on Saturday as well.
It’s a “regular,” $179 Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge play-in with one $10,000 seat certain to be awarded. The winning ratio here is 1-per-65.
Contest races on Saturday for the 12-race tourneys are the 7th through 12th at Gulfstream, the 6th, 8th and 10th from Tampa; and the 1st, 4th and 5th from The Great Race Place (Santa Anita).
The 25 races players can choose from in Saturday’s All Optional Live tourneys are the 7th through 12th at Gulfstream; the 6th through 10th from Tampa; the 5th through 9th at Aqueduct; and the full, nine-race card from Santa Anita.
Ten featured contests (including seven “AOLs”) are on tap Sunday at HorseTourneys, plus two 12-race games at HorsePlayers.
Here, we’ll start with the non-AOLs, because one of them is slightly out of the ordinary. It’s our $10,000 Guaranteed Big Bucks tourney. These games, which carry an entry fee of $1,150 and permit no more than 20 participants, are always run as Pick & Prays. What makes this particular one a tad different is that we had one last weekend and we typically only offer them every other week. Well…participation has been stronger than usual as of late, so we’re going to start offering them every week…at least for now. Payoffs go to just the top three finishers on a 70%/20%/10% basis.
We also have a 12-race, up-to-$5,000 Exacta tourney with $1,000 Guaranteed. These are always run as 12-race, live-format contests. Players pick a three-horse-exacta box in each of the contest races, and their scores are credited with the returns of a $1.00 base play.
There’s also our $8 Pick 6 Jackpot tourney. These are always run in live-format and they are (obviously) just six races long. Seventy percent of the net pool goes to top finishers via the normal, $2 win/place scoring method, while the other 30% is directed to the Jackpot pool. No one has hit the Jackpot yet…although Eric Kurzhal gave it a great try last week, hitting the first four, then missing the last two (which were both won by favorites). The Jackpot is now all the way up to $5,453. If more than one get all six races right, the Jackpot is shared. Again, this one costs just $8 to play.
The other seven Sunday features at HorseTourneys will be run in the All Optional Live format…including our “regular” up-to-$20,000 cash tourney with $10,000 Guaranteed. The entry fee here is a more modest $195, and entries are capped at 118.
Also on tap is an “AOL” opportunity to earn an all-inclusive package to the 2020 The BIG One at Laurel. Fifteen contest seats and at least $75,000 in cash will be at stake September 19-20—shared among a field that will number no more than 57. The qualifier carries an entry fee of $395 and entires are limited to 26. One prize is guaranteed. Winners receive a package that includes hotel, travel stipend, welcome dinner, top shelf amenities at Laurel and more. At The BIG One, the top 10 finishers will receive cash bonuses plus their choice of a seat to the NHC, BCBC or Pegasus World Cup. Finishers 11-15 get either $1,500 or a Horse Players World Series entry. (Their choice.)
Low Ratio qualifiers to the April 19 Keeneland Grade One Gamble have become more and more popular of late, and we have another one of them on Sunday. It’s $460 to play, and one in 10 will pick up a $3,500 Keeneland entry plus $500 for travel.
We’re back to an entry-only qualifier for Sunday’s Horse Player World Series play-in. It’s $89 to take part, and one in 20 will earn a $1,500 entry to venerable three-day event at The Orleans…home of Big Al’s Oyster Bar, where the odds of getting a cheerful server is about the same as winning a HorseTourneys qualifier (about 1 in 20).
The Flo-Cal Faceoff is an online event, so our Sunday qualifier to the $100,000 Guaranteed cash tourney isn’t quite a “last-chance” but, still, time’s a wastin’ since the two-day Faceoff begins next Saturday. Winners of our Sunday qualifier receive $1,500 entries. The entry fee is $86, and the winning ratio is a Big Al’s-like 1 per 20.
The weekend after the Flo-Cal Faceoff is the TSG Ultimate Betting Challenge. It takes place on March 7 and may be played at Gulfstream, Santa Anita or at xpressbet.com. One of every 20 entries—at $207 per entry—in our Sunday qualifier for the TSG contest will move on to the main event with a $3,000 entry plus $500 for travel.
Last but far from least is our Sunday All Optional Live qualifier to the popular Monmouth Pick Your Prize tournament on June 1. You can play in this play-in for $148 and one in 20 will receive a $2,000 entry plus $500 for transportation to Oceanport.
At HorsePlayers, there are co-features on Sunday—both 12-race, live-format tourneys.
One is a 2021 NHC qualifier with an entry fee of $165. The other is a Low Ratio Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge play-in. It’s $500 to take part in this one. Two seats are guaranteed in the NHC game; one in the BCBC event.
We send out special good wishes to the many HorseTourneys qualifiers who will be competing on Saturday at the Santa Anita February Challenge…and equally-good good wishes to the rest of you in whatever form your weekend exploits take.