Three NHC seats will be up for grabs on the first day of July (Saturday) when HorsePlayers hosts its latest free qualifier. If you are a 2023 NHC Tour member, it’s free to play. If you are not one, you can become one quickly and easily at NTRA.com in exchange for a $50 membership fee.
The fun freebie is one of 25 featured events this Friday, Saturday and Sunday—and all but one of them (the Sunday Big Bucks game) will be a Pick & Pray.
On Friday, the first seven of those 25 take place.
Friday’s HT Tour competition is our $15,000 Guaranteed, No Limit Pick & Pray. You can participate for $190.
On all three days of the weekend that takes us from June to July, you can attempt to win entries to the Spa & Surf Showdown, the Haskell Challenge, the Saratoga Challenge and the William Moore Classic at Delaware Park.
The Spa & Surf Showdown is the $400,000 Guaranteed final leg of the 2023 Tourney Triple here at HorseTourneys. The qualifier entry fee on Friday (and Saturday and Sunday as well) is $147, with one of every 20 entrants landing a $2,500 place in the mythical, all-cash event that requires participants to play all the races at Saratoga and Del Mar on August 5-6.
The Haskell Challenge is an online-only contest set for July 22 at Xpressbet and 4NJBets. Seats that day will cost $1,000 apiece, but you can get one on Friday for $79 in our 1-per-15 qualifier.
The price points are the same for our qualifiers to the Saratoga Challenge. One of every 15 participants, at $79 per entry, get a $1,000 berth playable on August 12 either on-track at Saratoga or online at NYRABets.com.
The William Moore Classic is a $500-per entry, on-site tournament at Delaware Park on July 15. Our weekend qualifiers to it are all $59, 1-per-10 Pick & Prays.
Over at HorsePlayers on Friday, you get your first shot of the week at the NHC—and also a qualifier for the Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge.
The NHC tourney is a $75 NHC Pick & Pray that guarantees two seats to the March 2024 renewal. The winning ratio is 1-per-143.
For $500, you can play in a Low Ratio Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge Pick & Pray. At least one $10,000 seat is guaranteed to be handed out regardless of participation. The winning ratio in this one works out to 1-per-23.
The 10 featured-tourney races on Friday are the 5th, 6th, 8th and 9th from Belmont; the 6th through 8th at Gulfstream; and the 7th through 9th from Laurel.
There are nine featured tourneys (all Pick & Prays) on Saturday, and we’ll lead with the two at HorsePlayers—since that is the site of the free NHC qualifier.
It’s a veritable three-for-all—a free NHC Pick & Pray with three 2024 spots certain to be won. Again, you must be a current, paid-up 2023 NHC Tour member in order to play and win. Also, this is a 15-race tourney (unlike the other Saturday features which consist of 12 races).
The 15-race slate is: Races 5 and 6 from Monmouth; the 6th through 8th (including two graded stakes) at Delaware; the 6th through 10th (including a couple of more graded stakes) from Belmont and races 7 through 11 at Gulfstream where the Grade III Smile Sprint Stakes highlights the card. First post for this 15-race tourney is scheduled for 2:32 pm ET.
The other Saturday feature at HorsePlayers is a 12-race, 1-per-65 Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge Pick & Pray with one $10,000 entry guaranteed to be won. The entry fee is $179.
Seven Pick & Prays are on the board on Saturday here at HorseTourneys.
The richest tourney of the weekend is Saturday’s $30,000 Guaranteed No Limit Pick & Pray. An entry will cost you $350 in this HT Tour event.
The other Saturday cash feature is our $10,000 Guaranteed Big Bucks Pick & Pray, which requires an entry fee of $1,150. Total entries are capped at 20, with the winner earning 70 percent of the net pool, the runner up getting 20 percent, and the third-place taking home the remaining 10 percent. If we happen to reach the maximum entry count of 20, the total purse will exceed $20,000.
On Saturday, we offer our weekly qualifier to the July 29-30 Del Mar Summer Challenge. One of every 20 entrants will reel in a $6,500 package ($6,000 entry fee plus $500 travel stipend) for the popular live-bankroll tournament at beautiful Del Mar.
As promised earlier, we’ll have Pick & Pray qualifiers to the Spa & Surf Showdown , the Haskell Challenge, the Saratoga Challenge and the William Moore Classic at Delaware. The same entry fees and winning ratios in place for Friday apply here as well.
The contest races for our 12-race featured tourneys (all but the free NHC qualifier) are the 7th and 8th from Delaware; the 6th through 10th at Belmont; and the 7th through 11th from Gulfstream. Closing time is scheduled to be 3:00 pm ET.
Nine more marquee games come your way on Sunday.
Sunday is the day of the week when we offer our guaranteed qualifier for the October 21-22 The BIG One at Laurel Park, which has an all-cash prize pool in 2024. The winner earns a spot in October’s small-field, big-money contest…plus hotel, welcome party, track transfers and full food and open-bar amenities at the track…plus $500 for your travel. The entry fee is $500, and the runner up gets a $500 consolation refund. If you’re not sure whether you want to try to qualify, ask a past The BIG One participant what they thought of their contest experience. We’ll abide by their answer!
Sunday’s HT Tour competition is our $20,000 Guaranteed Pick & Pray. Entries are $250 each.
The other Sunday featured cash tourney is the only Live-format game of the weekend—our $7,000 Guaranteed Big Bucks event. Payouts go just to the top three finishers on a 70/20/10 basis. A maximum of 20 entries (at $1,150 each) will be accepted—and if we get that many, the purse will top $20,000.
For the third straight day, you can try and secure a place in the $400,000 Guaranteed Spa & Surf Showdown, the Haskell Challenge, the Saratoga Challenge and the William Moore Classic at Delaware Park.
Meanwhile, opportunities to qualify for the the Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge and the NHC await you at HorsePlayers on Sunday.
The BCBC game is a $500 Low-Ratio Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge qualifier. The winning ratio is 1-per-23 in this Pick & Pray, and, as with all BCBC qualifiers at HorsePlayers, at least one $10,000 seat will definitely be awarded regardless of turnout.
The Sunday NHC qualifier, another Pick & Pray, guarantees two seats and carries an entry fee of $210. The winning ratio works out to 1-per-50.
We’ll take a day off from multi-track tourneys on Monday, but we have a very nice assortment of events for your contest-playing pleasure on the Fourth.
Seven featured events—all presumably familiar to you by this point…and all very much worth winning. Enjoy your weekend leading up to Independence Day. We’ll be back in this space on Monday to recap the Friday-Saturday-Sunday goings on. In the meantime, good luck!