Official statement from McKay Smith, President, HorseTourneys.com:

“News accounts today reported that the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority (HISA) has made charges against Marshall Gramm, contending that he obtained non-public horse-health information from the HISA portal from early May to mid-June of this year and that he engaged in a variety of thoroughbred industry activities during that same period, including participating in handicapping contests.”

“For the record, Mr. Gramm has not engaged in any paid activity at HorseTourneys/HorsePlayers since March 30, 2025. In 2026, he did participate in two free NHC qualifying tournaments, which were available to all members of the 2026 NHC Tour. The two such contests took place on May 7 and July 26. He finished unplaced in both of those events.”

The handicapping marksmanship of “Pistol” Pete Acocella was on full display last weekend. He hit the target two times on Saturday and twice more on Sunday.

William “23” Sadoo hit 47-1 shot Take a Stance ($96.20, $36.22) in Sunday’s first contest race, the 6th at Saratoga, and that led to a lot of winning for the Pennsylvanian-turned-Californian.

Handicapping is difficult enough that any good day is worth celebrating. William McMillan didn’t have just one day to feel happy about, though. He was on a near-weeklong heater.

It began on Thursday.

Almost all of the Saturday and Sunday Featured Tourneys last weekend were conducted in Live format. However, when Temecula, Calif., car dealer Michael Caposio plays Live games here, he typically treats them like Pick & Prays. On Sunday, that method worked extremely well for him.

I have no reason to believe that Evan Trommer is a selfish person. However, he certainly hijacked the Fourth of July—at least around here at HorseTourneys.

With the Saratoga meet set to begin on Friday, July 3, we will once again be offering a Super Survivor tourney like we have done previously for Keeneland and Gulfstream—except that, this time around, there will be two such games available to play. One with the customary one-time entry fee of $50, and one with a buy-in of $250. So choose your pleasure. Or choose them both.

For those of you unfamiliar with our Super Survivor tourneys, here’s how they work:

Last March, Kevin Engelhard was inducted into the NHC Hall of Fame. Last Thursday, he made sure that he will be playing two entries the next time he shows up at the big dance.

Sometimes you’re good, sometimes you’re lucky and sometimes you’re both. On Sunday, Jimmy Cosenza was definitely good.

Questions occasionally arise regarding family members, spouses, or friends participating in the same tournament. Because HorseTourneys takes contest integrity seriously, we believe it is important to explain how these situations are evaluated.

We understand why players are concerned about related participants competing in the same contest. Integrity is important, and no player wants to feel that someone else has an unfair advantage.

First, it is important to distinguish between participation and leverage.

In a typical mythical tournament, participants are selecting horses across 10-12 races. Even using conservative assumptions, the number of possible outcome combinations runs into the hundreds of millions or billions.

For example, consider a mythical tournament with 10 races.

If each race contains only 8 betting interests, there are more than one billion possible winner combinations.

Two coordinated entries can cover exactly two of those possible paths. Even ten coordinated entries cover only ten.

As a result, a small number of coordinated entries simply does not create meaningful leverage over the tournament. This distinction is important.

A participant entering under a spouse’s name is not creating a new type of advantage. They are simply adding another entry to the contest, just as any other player could do if additional entries were permitted.

HorseTourneys therefore focuses on meaningful leverage rather than relationships.

We monitor for obvious coordination, entry matrixing, and situations involving larger groups of related participants. These are the circumstances that could potentially create a material competitive advantage and are addressed under our rules.

However, participation by a pair of related individuals, standing alone, does not create a meaningful threat to tournament integrity. In nearly twenty years of HorseTourneys operation, we have never identified a situation involving a family pair that materially affected a tournament outcome through coordinated play.

Our goal is simple: maintain a fair and competitive environment while focusing enforcement on conduct that can realistically impact contest results.