We hope you had a nice first weekend of 2024—but it probably wasn’t as good as Jim Lisowsky’s.

Lisowsky assured himself of a nice Saturday by capturing the $9,973 top prize in Saturday’s $7,000 Gtd. Big Bucks Pick & Pray, which paid out a total of $14,248.

Unfortunately for other Saturday players, the Texas resident also deployed his 3-win, 0-place selections in three other tourneys—which assured him of not just a nice Saturday…but a highly exciting first quarter of 2024.

Lisowsky took Saturday’s NHC Low Ratio play-in at HorsePlayers, and he also led a parade of six $1,500 seat winners in the same day’s Flo-Cal Faceoff qualifier.

Also gaining spots in the $250,000 Guaranteed first leg of the 2024 HorseTourneys Grand Slam here were 2023 HT Tour champ Ed Peters (3 wins, 1 place), Douglas Schenk (3W, 2P), 2020 Spa & Surf Showdown victor Scott Fiedler (1W, 1P), Richard Seidl (1W, 1P) and Travis “Subaru” Forrister (4W, 2P).

Lisowsky wasn’t done, though. He also picked up a $6,500 package to the Jan. 27 Pegasus World Cup Betting Championship for running second to David Lupo (3 firsts, 4 seconds).

In all, Lisowsky amassed about $13,000 worth of seats (give or take) plus the $9,973 in cash…which should cover his Racing Forms for those upcoming contests and then some. 

As for Lupo, his Saturday was highlighted by wire-to-wire grass stakes winner Tocayo ($29.80, $8.60) in the 11th at Gulfstream. And this victory wasn’t Lupo’s only one of the week. Two days prior, he secured himself a place in the Flo-Cal Faceoff.

Lupo picked 4 winners—topped by Bustin Shout ($14.60, $4.70) in the 5th at Aqueduct—and 1 runner up. Peter Duca (3 wins, 4 places) also got a $1,500 Flo-Cal entry for checking in second. He hit the final two contest-race winners in order to nail down his spot in the first leg of the $250,000 two-day tourney here on Jan. 20-21.

On Wednesday, there were three featured tourneys and four grand prize winners. The common thread throughout all of them—from a horse standpoint—was Magical Marriage ($28.40, $10.00) in race 9 at Tampa Bay Downs.

Both Turner West (2 wins, 5 places) and Derek Isenberg (6W, 0P) had Magical Marriage en route to their respective $1,500 seats in Wednesday’s Flo-Cal Faceoff qualifier. Isenberg swept the final five contest races to get up for that second spot.

The Magical Marriage victory came in the final contest race, and it propelled James Shalvey to victory in Wednesday’s featured cash tourney.

Shalvey finished with 4 firsts and 2 seconds and took home the winner’s share of $2,737 in Wednesday’s $5,000 Guaranteed game, which finished up with a total purse of $6,083.

John Struthers (4 firsts, 3 seconds) also connected with Magical Marriage at the end.

Struthers got the $1,000 bankroll in Wednesday’s play-in to the Jan. 27 Houston Racing Festival Handicapping Contest on-track (only) at Sam Houston.

Thursday’s featured cash event was our $6,000 Gtd. Pick & Pray. The final pot came to $9,124.

“Battlin’” William Smith (5 firsts, 1 second) got the money here—$4,106, to be precise—thanks in part to hitting the inappropriately named Chalky Cat ($14.00, $4.10) in the final contest heat, race 8 at Aqueduct.

Days don’t get too much chalkier than what we saw on Friday, when the biggest payoff among the 10 contest was that provided by Chasingserendipity—$8.10 to win and $3.40 to place—in the 5th at Santa Anita. 

The two highest scorers on Friday—Jim Herron (6 wins, 2 places) and Chris Weikel (6W, 1P)—each got rewarded for their efforts with low-cost NHC seats in the day’s $75 play-in at HorseTourneys.

Herron hit the first three winners and the final two. He and Weikel were the only two players on Friday to crack the $60 barrier. 

George Chute bagged the $9,426 first prize in Friday’s HT Tour event, our $15,000 Gtd, Pick & Pray, which closed its doors with $20,947 in the kitty.

Chute laddered his way to the top with 6 winners, the biggest of which returned $7.80.

On days when prices are low, you aren’t as likely to see people win multiple grand prizes. Four altogether different players garnered $1,500 Flo-Cal Faceoff seats in Friday’s play-in.

Congratulations to John “The Clocker” Nichols (4 wins, 2 places), Eric Kurzhal (3W, 2P), Richard Seidl (4W, 2P) and Ed Reidy (4W, 1P). Kurzhal’s two best returns came with his two runners up. Seidl, meanwhile (as noted earlier), went on to grab yet another Flo-Cal seat 24 hours later for finishing not too far behind Saturday stalwart Jim Lisowsky.

Speaking of Saturday, Lisowsky didn’t win all the features that day. Michael Caposio captured the lucrative $25,000 Gtd. Pick & Pray, which served as the day’s HT Tour event.

Caposio (3 wins, 3 places) couldn’t be beaten in large part due to Can’t Beat Me ($52.00, $20.40) in the 9th at Aqueduct. Caposio collected $15,523 in a game that was ultimately worth a total of $34,496.

Joseph Rich (3 wins, 0 places) and Vance “Great” Normand (2W, 3P) were the two winners in Saturday’s Houston Racing Festival Handicapping Contest qualifier. 

Rich prospered with Can’t Beat Me. Normand’s big horse was Tocayo ($29.80, $8.60) in the 11th at Gulfstream.

Over at HorsePlayers, Mike Steindler landed the big, $10,000 seat in Saturday’s $179 Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge Pick & Pray.

Steindler’s 3 winners included the day’s two biggest pries—Can’t Beat Me and Tocayo.

“Captain” Frank Sorensen missed Tocayo, but he had Can’t Beat Me and also Irish Prophet ($12.80, $5.80) in the day’s final contest race (the 9th at Santa Anita).

Sorensen came away with the March 2024 spot in the Saturday NHC qualifier that was restricted to non-winners of a 2024 seat.

Sunday was a “spread the wealth” kind of day with 15 different players accounting for the day’s 15 grand prizes. Two of those winners were Barbara Small (5 wins, 2 places) and Daniel Wolf (3W, 5P).

They were the two to punch their tickets to Vegas in Sunday’s $165 NHC Pick & Pray. They both had the day’s priciest winner in Sovereign of Speed ($21.00, $11.00) in the day’s first contest race, the 5th at Tampa. Wolf got up for 2nd thanks to a $17.80 place collection at the end provided by 21-1 Santa Anita race 7 runner up Remote.

It turned out to be a nice weekend for past HT Tour champions. We mentioned higher up that 2023 Tour hero Ed Peters got himself a Flo-Cal Faceoff entry on Saturday. The trend continued on Sunday in our $20,000 Gtd. Pick & Pray.

This was Sunday’s HT Tour event, so I suppose it makes sense that past champs would do well here. At any rate, 2022 HT Tour champion Travis Pearson (4 wins, 4 places) got the up-top money of $13,682 while our inaugural HT Tour kingpin  (in 2021) Jorge Cruz-Aedo finished 2nd and earned $5,473 for his efforts. In case you are scoring at home and are wondering whether 2023 champ Ed Peters also played in this game…he did. Alas, Peters finished 127th.

The other Sunday cash feature, our $7,000 Gtd. Big Bucks tourney, went to Evan Trommer.

Trommer stockpiled 5 winners and 3 runners up to take home the grand prize of $5,699. His top return came with Morgan Point ($7.60, $3.80) in race 6 at Gulfstream. The final prize pool in this one was $8,142.

Ken Jordan got the rich, $6,500 package in Sunday’s play-in to the Jan. 27 Pegasus World Cup Betting Championship.

Jordan’s big horse came right at the outset—Sovereign of Speed at odds of 9-1 in the 5th at Tampa Bay Downs.

Todd Van Drie (3 wins, 1 place) and Christopher “Mary Queen of” Skotz (4W, 0P) also enjoyed speedy starts thanks to Sovereign of Speed. 

Van Drie and Skotz were the two profiteers in Sunday’s qualifier to the Houston Racing Festival Handicapping Contest.

Seven players added their names to the roster of participants for the $250,000 Gtd. Flo-Cal Faceoff here on Jan. 20-21.

Leading the way was The People’s CFO, Joe “JK” Koury, who put up 3 wins and 2 places. Joining Koury in the Flo-Cal field will be Lawrence Kahlden (3W, 4P), John Gaspar (whose 3 winners all cam at the very beginning), Gary Blair (2W, 2P), Bill Redman (4W, 2P), David Barnier (3W, 4P) and Steve Terelak (2W, 2P). 

Jim Meeks was the big winner on Sunday over at HorsePlayers.

He had Sovereign of Speed at the beginning and a $17.80 place collection with 21-1 Remote at the end to finish with 2 firsts and 4 seconds and lay claim to the $10,000 seat in Sunday’s Low Ratio Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge Pick & Pray.

Keep an eye out this coming week for our first qualifiers to the 2024 NHC Last Chance tournament and the 2024 Tampa Last Chance/First Chance contest. Last but not first (or least), thanks to all for playing last week!