It’s hard to keep up with the sporting calendar this year (as evidenced by the fact that the Preakness is a week from Saturday). Among all the other “how-can-this-be’s?” is the fact that we’re also already up to the final free NHC qualifier for the 2020 season. It takes place on Saturday, and it’s one of 21 marquee games this weekend.
As always, however, our featured-tourney fun gets rolling on Friday.
Santa Anita opens back up on Friday and The Great Race Place recently announced that it will be hosting a Santa Anita Autumn Challenge at Xpressbet (or 4NJBets for New Jersey residents) this Saturday. That doesn’t leave much time for qualifiers…but we had one on Thursday, and we’re hosting a Last Chance (second chance?) play-in on Friday. It’s $118 to play in this Pick & Pray and 1 in 15 will earn a $1,500 entry for the following day.
There’s also a Friday Pick & Pray qualifier to the Keeneland Fall NHC/BCBC Online Challenge. You can secure a $3,000 entry to the October 10 cybertest at Xpressbet for $175 here. The winning ratio is 1-per-20.
If it takes six figures to pique your interest, then you could shoot for a seat to the $150,000 Guaranteed Flo-Cal Faceoff on January 8th and 9th. It’s $118 to play, and one of every 15 entries will win. Reminder: The Flo-Cal Faceoff serves as the first leg of the brand new 2021 Tourney Triple series consisting of the Flo-Cal Faceoff, the Players Championship and the Spa & Surf Showdown. As a bonus, tournament seats await the top three overall performers, and if you win two of the three events, you earn a $1 million bonus. Win all three, and you receive $2 million.
Immediate-gratification types may prefer Friday’s $10,000 Guaranteed No Limit Pick & Pray. It’s not a “win-and-you’re-in,” it’s a “win-and-get-paid.” Entries are $190 each.
Over at HorsePlayers, there’s one qualifier on Friday for the NHC and one for the Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge.
Friday’s $75 NHC Pick & Pray will award a minimum of two seats, and NHC Tour points will also be up for grabs to those finishing in the top 10 percent. It’s a Pick & Pray with a winning ratio of 1 in 143.
The Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge qualifier is a Low Ratio Pick & Pray. At least one $10,000 entry is certain to be won in this $500 event. The winning ratio here: 1-per-23.
Friday contest races are the 8th through 10th from Belmont; the 9th and 10th at Pimlico; and the 6th through 10th from Santa Anita’s opening-day card—10 races in all.
There are six featured tourneys on Saturday. We’ll start with the HorsePlayers slate because that one contains the game that the majority of you should all be playing.
It’s the aforementioned, free NHC qualifier. This one is a little more straightforward than some of the others this year. One day…12 races…finish in the top three and you win. It’s a Pick & Pray and please note: you must be a 2020 NHC Tour member in order to participate and win.
You have two choices when it comes to Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge qualifiers. Saturday’s “regular” BCBC play-in has one grand prize guaranteed and carries an entry fee of $179. It’s a live-format tourney with a winning ratio of 1-per-65.
The winning ratio is just 1-per-11 in Saturday’s Super Low Ratio BCBC Pick & Pray. It also assures at least one winner—even if fewer than 11 sign up. The entry fee here is $1,000.
Here at HorseTourneys, it’s all about money on Saturday.
Topping the list of three features is a Live-format $25,000 Guaranteed, No Limit cash tourney. An entry fee of $260 gets you your own personal cyber-carrel for this one.
Then there’s Saturday’s $10,000 Guaranteed Big Bucks tourney. The entry fee is $1,150, and the field is limited to 20, unless there are any very late entries due to last-minute feeders. If the game is sold out, the purse will rise to over $20,000. As always with Big Bucks events, payoffs go only to the top three finishers—on a 70%/20%/10% basis.
It looked like the $8 Pick 6 Jackpot was going down last Saturday…and even more so on Sunday. Those darned horses don’t always read the script, though (or the Racing Form). Enough complaining. Saturday’s game has a carryover of $23,233. That is what will be won or shared if anyone can go 6-for-6. Seventy percent of net entry fees get paid out via traditional win/place scoring totals while 30% gets directed to the Jackpot.
The Pick 6 Jackpot races on Saturday are the 6th and 7th at Gulfstream; the 2nd and 3rd from Santa Anita; and the 8th and 9th at Belmont. Five of the six races are stakes, and there are 42 betting interests—before scratches—across the six races. Note that the start time for this game is a touch on the early side—2:50 pm ET.
Meanwhile the 12 contest races for the other two featured tourneys here, and the three at HorsePlayers, are the 1st, 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th from the very strong Saturday program at Santa Anita; the 8th and 10th from the Gulfstream Florida Sire Stakes card; the 7th, 8th and 10th at Belmont; and race 11 and 12 from Monmouth Park. Eight of the 12 races are stakes.
Sunday is our busiest day of the weekend with nine featured tourneys—seven here at two at HorsePlayers.
Here comes your second opportunity of the weekend to qualifiy for the Keeneland Fall NHC/BCBC Online Challenge ($175 entry fee) and the Flo-Cal Faceoff ($118). Both are Pick & Prays.
You can also win a “Bally’s Berth” in a Low Ratio NHC Pick & Pray. This one isn’t free like Saturday’s play-in, but the $500 entry fee buys you a lower-than-usual winning ratio to conquer. Note that this event must attract at least 10 entries to be a “go.”
Also to be run as a Pick & Pray is Sunday’s $15,000 Guaranteed No Limit tourney. The entry fee is $195, and the more entries, the bigger the prize pool…though it won’t be less than $15,000.
The Sunday Big Bucks tourney guarantees $7,500, though the pot for this Live-format event could reach $20,000 or more depending on how many play. The entry fee is $1,150, and payoffs go only to the top three finishers.
Our up-to-$5,000 Exacta tourney with $1,000 Guaranteed is also always run in Live format. In this 12-race game, you choose a three-horse exacta box in each race. Biggest return based on $1 payoffs over the course of the 12 races wins. The entry fee is $125, and no payoff caps are in effect.
The second of the weekend’s two $8 Pick 6 Jackpot tourneys is scheduled for Sunday. Check out our Twitter feed on Saturday night or our home page on Sunday for an update on what the Jackpot will be. It will be based on how many people take a shot at the Saturday Jackpot (which starts out at $23,233)…and whether anyone wins it. Like the Exacta tourney, the Pick 6 Jackpot competition is always a live-format game.
The NHC and the Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge share the spotlight at HorsePlayers on Sunday.
The NHC qualifier is a “regular,” $165, 1-per-65 tourney with two seats to Vegas guaranteed. It’s a live-format game.
Also in live-format is Sunday’s Low Ratio Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge qualifier with a winning ratio of 1-per-23. The entry fee is $500, and at least one $10,000 entry is sure to be awarded.
Before we part ways, we wanted to alert you about our big-money cash tourneys on Preakness Day. There’s a $50,000 Guaranteed live-format game and a $20,000 Guaranteed Pick & Pray.
We’re only about nine days away from the big day at Old Hilltop. We’ll have feeders for the two big cash games pretty much each day between now and then. In the meantime, have an enjoyable last weekend of September and…good luck!