MOOD SWINGS

ANSWERS TO (intelligent) COMMENTS/QUESTIONS...

Trainer Steve Asmussen is racing out of Detention, which only means that a security guard hangs around his stable. Not much more than that.

Old timer REGAL MISTER who once ran in the Woodbine Mile was involved in a spill at Fort Erie yesterday...readers wonder if he's okay..



SCOREBOARD (through yesterday, Equibase stats)

FORT ERIE HORSES (by Wins)

Name Starts 1st 2nd 3rd Earnings

Spirit to Run 7 3 1 1 $25,888
African Rainbow 4 3 1 0 $35,200
Krz n' Flashy 4 3 1 0 $28,600
Expect No Regret 5 3 1 0 $23,070
Way to Run 5 3 1 0 $21,692
Bright N Golden 4 3 0 1 $24,838
Bad Boy Will 3 3 0 0 $22,968
Asclipianoulla 4 3 0 0 $19,810


FORT ERIE TRAINERS

Name Starts 1st 2nd 3rd Earnings

Nicholas Gonzalez 59 14 12 7 $171,522
Donald C. MacRae 40 12 9 3 $118,487
Michael Newell 78 10 9 9 $97,794
John Simms 60 9 14 12 $110,568
Kevin Buttigieg 71 9 8 13 $93,996
Daniel Wills 35 9 4 6 $85,433
Ashlee Brnjas 24 9 2 2 $63,549
James W. Woods 25 7 3 5 $84,253
Nathan Squires 50 6 6 9 $69,443


FORT ERIE JOCKEYS

Name Starts 1st 2nd 3rd Earnings

Chad Beckon 228 46 42 32 $544,608
Christopher Griffith 156 26 19 18 $297,857
Cory Clark 180 23 23 24 $272,642
Rui M. Pimentel 131 22 20 21 $257,903
Kristopher Robinson 145 20 15 22 $228,282
David Garcia 71 14 11 11 $154,217
Edward Robinson 144 11 13 14 $142,713


WOODBINE HORSES

Name Starts 1st 2nd 3rd Earnings

Drunken Love 5 4 1 0 $167,220
Fatal Bullet 4 4 0 0 $198,360
U R Energy 6 3 2 1 $45,466
Legal Move 6 3 1 1 $248,809
Zounds 5 3 1 1 $132,668
Not Bourbon 4 3 1 0 $810,000
Igottogojoe 5 3 1 0 $59,660
Hydethetreasure 7 3 0 2 $60,140
Southern Exchange 3 3 0 0 $216,000
Starticus 3 3 0 0 $120,540
Emma Ain't Bluffin 3 3 0 0 $74,040
Sugar N Tabacco 3 3 0 0 $41,400
Springledge 3 3 0 0 $36,060


WOODBINE TRAINERS


Name Starts 1st 2nd 3rd Earnings

Steven M. Asmussen 122 21 16 13 $1,294,987
Mark E. Casse 176 20 23 22 $1,762,570
Sid C. Attard 130 20 20 16 $1,149,960
Scott H. Fairlie 102 19 18 13 $725,425
Reade Baker 133 17 16 18 $1,113,695
Roger L. Attfield 92 17 10 13 $1,778,418
Nicholas Gonzalez 83 17 9 10 $1,161,382
Robert P. Tiller 119 16 19 16 $867,775
Michael J. Doyle 120 15 10 14 $692,555
Terry Jordan 36 15 6 2 $587,914
Brian A. Lynch 41 14 6 4 $1,159,590
Michael P. De Paulo 86 13 12 9 $755,692
Daniel J. Vella 89 13 12 9 $745,610
Laurie Silvera 106 12 13 18 $606,597
Audre Cappuccitti 105 12 9 14 $401,152
Ian Black 61 12 6 8 $723,903
Ralph J. Biamonte 53 11 7 9 $360,551
Malcolm Pierce 80 10 14 7 $799,513
Abraham R. Katryan 88 10 11 16 $361,990


LEADING JOCKEYS

Name Starts 1st 2nd 3rd Earnings

James McAleney 319 61 45 41 $3,379,395
Emile Ramsammy 371 49 51 50 $2,648,110
Eurico Rosa Da Silva 350 47 42 40 $2,504,830
Patrick Husbands 267 47 39 30 $2,875,627
Emma-Jayne Wilson 361 42 43 54 $2,534,771
Tyler Pizarro 284 39 34 33 $1,655,471
Chantal Sutherland 305 38 37 48 $1,949,434
David Clark 248 32 31 26 $2,038,525
Jono C. Jones 250 30 33 31 $2,589,161
Justin Stein 261 28 32 22 $1,253,238
Slade Callaghan 170 20 15 16 $980,069
Jerry Baird 172 19 14 27 $1,182,447
Robert C. Landry 140 17 18 24 $1,257,999
Constant Montpellier 168 16 21 18 $956,813
Corey Fraser 140 14 17 21 $939,895
Richard Anthony Dos Ramos 112 13 9 11 $613,017



CANADIAN BRED 'LUCK'

Rainbows for Luck, a Canadian-bred gelding by Benny the Dip (bred by Sam-Son Farm) was 3rd in a maiden allowance HURDLE race on the non-betting day card at Saratoga's open house on Sunday.
The gelding was beaten 7 lengths but the race was the faster of all the hurdles on the card.



AAAHHHHH, THE SPA

SARATOGA'S BOUTIQUE SUMMER MEETING STARTS UP TOMORROW!!



DAILY RACING FORM'S DAVID GRENING talked about trainers to watch in the DRF for tomorrow (out today).


Woodbine based MARK CASSE is on the list (he has 12 stalls) and his list of 2yos to watch are:

Indy Game, a half-sister to King Cugat by A.P. Indy; Coffee Bar, a son of Mineshaft out of the dam Java, a half-sister to multiple Grade 1 winner Fiji; Conflicting Report, a son of Graeme Hall who is expected to run on Friday; and Closing Speed, a son of Cherokee Run whose third dam produced Kentucky Derby winner Sea Hero.



CASINO STRIKE STILL ON


Radio reports last week intimated that an agreement may have been made in the Casino security guard strike but that was not the case.
Talks broke down.
This is a report today from Casino Gambling Web:

Negotiations To Continue On Tuesday For Casino Worker Strike

Casino workers over the past couple of years have wizened up to allowing casinos to take advantage of them. Many workers at casinos all across the world have began to join unions in hopes of bettering their working conditions.

In Ontario, workers from three casinos walked out on their jobs on June 1st. They began a strike that is still ongoing, although the weekend lent itself to the possibility of the strike coming to an end.

Negotiations could again begin to take place as early as Tuesday. 850 workers have been without jobs since they started the strike. Woodbine Raceway in Toronto, and casinos in Sudbury and Brantford all saw their workers walk out on them.



MORE SARATOGA PREVIEW...

GOOD STORY ON PICKING WINNERS FROM POLYTRACK TRACKS..

By Matt Graves, www.timesunion.com


Picking winners tougher

First published: Tuesday, July 22, 2008

SARATOGA SPRINGS -- In a normal season, handicapping Saratoga Race Course is about as elementary as solving Rubik's Cube the first time you take it out of the box.

Now try it blindfolded.

That's the added dimension of uncovering winners when you have to factor in the murky ingredient of artificial surfaces now in use at a significant number of tracks where shippers race before coming to Saratoga for the 36-day meet.

Polytrack runners from places like Keeneland, Arlington, Turfway, Del Mar and Woodbine will be frequently interspersed in the fields of New York regulars who run exclusively on old-fashioned dirt surfaces. Throw in an occasional Cushion Track visitor from Hollywood and Santa Anita or a Tapeta Footings surface (trainer Michael Dickinson's own creation of sand, rubber and fiber coated with wax) like Golden Gate or Presque Isle, and what you have is a twilight zone of handicapping puzzles.

Look, I'm as concerned as the next person when it comes to horse safety in the wake of Barbaro and Eight Belles at Triple Crown venues on traditional dirt surfaces, but the rush to artificial surfaces has been somewhat disconcerting to me. Why wasn't more effort put into solving some of the issues regarding the old-fashioned dirt tracks and making them safer if all this money was going to be thrown into the artificial surfaces pot?

That's a point Hall of Fame trainer Nick Zito has pointedly made, and it makes plenty of sense to traditionalists like me. From this standpoint, the jury is still out on research regarding the effect of the synthetics on overall safety. It's been generally favorable regarding catastrophic breakdowns, but far from earth-shattering in terms of routine ..

read the rest at..

http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=705485&category=SPORTS&TextPage=1