One of the more noteworthy featured tourneys of the week took place on Friday when Kirk Rockwell finished first in the day’s Keeneland Fall BCBC/NHC Challenge qualifier.

Rockwell didn’t score big, but he scored often, racking up a highly impressive 8 winners out of 10 contest races. Happily for Jim “Never” Settle, there were enough entries signed on in this one for two $3,500 seats to be awarded. His 5-win, 1-place effort—that included Theadora Grace ($21.60, $7.60) in the 8th at Laurel—got him up for that very rewarding 2nd-place position.

This Friday Keeneland qualifier took on added significance two days later, when it became clear that Settle wasn’t settling for just the one victory during the week.

Settle put up a massive-for-the day score of $135.80 that was built on 5 winners, and he took home the $10,000 entry in Sunday’s Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge Low Ratio qualifier at HorsePlayers. Cal “Frontier” Jestice picked up a $5,000 partial entry for checking in second.

We’re not sure whether Settle is a fan of “The Flying Nun” (one of the many, many utterly implausible sitcoms of the 1960s) but his best return on Sunday came with Bertrille ($138.50, $56.00) in the day’s first contest race, the 5th at BAQ. 

Bertrille is a 3-year-old mare out of the Broken Vow mare Silly Sister.

Anyway…on Sunday, it was Settle who was flying, and the same selections brought him an…ahem…windfall in Sunday’s HT Tour event.

Here, Settle pocketed $10,139 in our $20,000 guaranteed cash game, which closed with a final purse of $22,531. And he got a $500 bonus since this was his second Sunday HT Tour triumph of 2024.

Settle actually improved his score slightly by adding a place collection to his portfolio  during the course of his 3rd and final victory of the day.

It was a triumph worth a $750 berth in the brand new BCBC Last Chance Tourney to be held here on Breeders’ Cup Eve (aka Halloween) on October 31.

For the week, Settle raked in $14,250 in contest seats plus $12,484 in cash. (He scooped up $1,845 for placing 3rd in Friday’s cash feature.) Not a bad week playing the ponies!

The featured-tourney contest week got off to a very fast start on Wednesday for “Pistol” Pete Acocella.

Acocella hit cap horse Turbonator ($56.00, $27.40) in the 6th at Horseshoe Indianapolis plus one other winner and one runner up to claim the $3,500 seat in Wednesday’s Keeneland Fall BCBC/NHC Challenge qualifier.

The same picks worked equally well for Acocella in Wednesday’s cash feature.

Here, Acocella banked $3,141 in Wednesday’s $5,000 Guaranteed cash tourney, which ultimately paid out a total of $6,981.

Wednesday’s other marquee game was a qualifier to the inaugural edition of the Pick & Pray Classic.

Frank “Plaster of” Paros (3 firsts, 1 second) was the winner in this one. His hold on the $2,000 seat for the $300,000-guaranteed competition really hardened after he hit Turbonator.

Thursday’s top event was our $6,000 Gtd, Pick & Pray.

Bobby Shoemaker recorded 4 winners—all of which paid double digits—and 1 runner up to reel in the up-top money of $3,577 in a game that closed its doors with $7,949 in the kitty.

Friday’s star was Rob Henie.

On a day without too many big prices, Henie (4 wins, 2 places) had the biggest—No Mo Candy ($22.40, $9.40) in the 8th at BAQ. His six collections added up to a day-best score of $8,304 and a victory worth $8,304 in Friday’s HT Tour battle, our $15,000 Gtd, Pick & Pray, which closed with a pot of $18,453.

Using the same picks, Henie also led the way in Friday $75 NHC qualifier at HorsePlayers.

Henie and fellow seat winner Luke Peltz (4 firsts 0 seconds) each connected with No Mo Candy and Theadora Grace ($21.60, $7.60) in the 8th at Laurel on the way to securing their passage to Las Vegas next March.

Another Theadora Grace backer was NHC Hall of Famer Paul Shurman.

Shurman (2 firsts, 4 seconds) garnered the $2,000 berth in Friday’s qualifier to the final leg of the 2024 HorseTourneys Grand Slam, the $300,000 Gtd. Pick & Pray Classic.

For Jim Cuzzupe (2 wins, 5 places) , the big Friday horse was Donegal Surges ($10.00, $6.50) in race 7 at BAQ.

Cuzzupe will be back in action this Saturday at Delaware Park–with a paid-up entry to the Delaware Park Handicapping Contest in his pocket.

Donegal Surges also led the hit parade for John Heims (4 wins, 2 places).

Heims exited with the $10,000 berth at the conclusion of Friday’s Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge Low Ratio qualifier at HorsePlayers.

Saturday’s Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge qualifier was a $179 “Regular Ratio” affair.

The two players to snag $10,000 entries in this tourney were the two to crack the $100 mark—David McCarty (4 wins, 0 places) and Eric Brothers (2W, 3P). The best return for both came via Rouki ($102.80, $30.40) in race 8 at Gulfstream.

Rouki and BAQ race 10 winner Reddington ($74.50,  $19.40) were the two big prices hiding out there on Saturday. Neither could avoid the detection of Mark Stillmock.

The two winners and nothing else gave Stillmock the highest score of the day. They also gave him the grand prize of $12,612 in Saturday’s HT Tour event, our $25,000 guaranteed tourney, which was ultimately worth a total of $28,028. This was Stillmock’s second Saturday HT Tour win of the 2024 campaign, so he also got a $500 bonus.

For John Gaspar, Rouki was the only winner of the day.

No matter. Gaspar added 3 place collections to the 50-1 bomb, and he prevailed in Saturday’s play-in to the Keeneland Fall BCBC/NHC Challenge on October 12.

For Howard Welsh, Reddington was the only winner of the day.

No matter. Welsh augmented Reddington with but one place payoff, yet still managed to take home the $5,699 grand prize in Saturday’s $8,142 Big Bucks Pick & Pray. It was the second consecutive Saturday Big Bucks triumph for Welsh.

Reddington was on the scorecard of Kirk Tesar (2 wins, 1 place).

Tesar won a $2,000 seat for this Thursday night in the Canterbury Park NHC/BCBC Handicapping Contest. Regardless of the outcome of that tournament, Tesar figures to be in an exceedingly good mood one week from today when there are no longer any games left on the Major League Baseball regular-season schedule.

Blake Courtney (3 wins, 0 places) and Michael Guadagno (2W, 2P) were the two to earn $750 entries in Saturday’s BCBC Last Chance Tourney qualifier.

Courtney connected with Rouki. Guadagno ($33.00 ahead of his nearest pursuer at the end) grinned with Reddington.

For NHC Hall of Famer Bill Shurman (6 wins, 0 places) and Donal Lydon (4W, 1P) the best return of the day on Saturday came with Rabaja ($11.40, $5.40) in the 11th at BAQ.

Shurman and Lydon were the two $2,000 entry winners in Saturday’s play-in to the November 23-24 Pick & Pray Classic, taking place right here at HorseTourneys. Lydon has been on a roll of late. On September 15, he won $11,123 in our Sunday cash feature.

With 3 wins and 1 place that included a Reddington BAQ attack, Craig “Home Sweet” Hom showed the way in Saturday’s $165 NHC qualifier.

The other available Vegas package went to Michael “Copa” Kavana, who counted Rouki among his 2 firsts and 1 second.

Playing with confidence, Hom came right “BAQ” on Sunday and won again.

This time, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow was a $2,000 Pick & Pray Classic seat. Hom made it happen with 6 firsts and 2 seconds. His highest-yielding selection was Being Betty ($19.60, $12.00) in the 9th at the Ozone Park, N.Y., oval. 

Joseph Perry (5 wins, 0 places) and Stephen Lerma (3W, 3P) finished tied at the top in Sunday’s Canterbury Park NHC/BCBC Handicapping Contest qualifier. However, Perry captured the $2,000 entry via tiebreaker by virtue of having picked more winners than Lerma.

The best pick for both players was Irish Maxima ($20.20, $9.00) in race 8 at Laurel.

Irish Maxima also brought luck to Jeff Bussan (3 wins, 1 place).

Bussan grabbed himself a $3,500 seat in Sunday’s qualifier to the Keeneland Fall BCBC/NHC Challenge.

Irish Maxima was one of 4 consecutive winners picked by Charley Witt.

Witt finished the day with 5 firsts and 1 second—good for first place and a $6,000 berth in this Saturday’s California Crown Betting Championship.

In Sunday’s $210 NHC qualifier at HorsePlayers, it was Chris “Army Strong” Lavezza (6 wins, 1 place) and Alistair Wallbaum (5W, 1P) who reeled in the Vegas spots.

Lavezza fired a winning shot with Irish Maxima. Wallbaum, meanwhile, got up late for 2nd by having each of the final two contest-race winners. Being Betty was the priciest item in his shopping cart. 

Best wishes to all HorseTourneys qualifiers who will be competing this coming week in contests at Canterbury Park, Santa Anita Park and Delaware Park. Here at the site, we’ll be back with a full menu of featured cash games and play-ins for your handicapping pleasure on Wednesday through Sunday. And you can read about what happened in those features right here in this space next Monday. In the meantime, good luck!