The latest addition to the regular HorseTourneys lineup will premiere this Saturday. It’s a $25-buy-in, $2,000-Guaranteed, Low-Cap tourney, in which the maximum payouts for every mythical $2.00 win and place selection will be $26.00 (12-1) to win and $14.00 (6-1) to place.

The Ks were Special last week.

The Breeders’ Cup was still a day away, but while many of us were understandably preoccupied with handicapping Keeneland, Michael “Copa” Kavana didn’t ignore the matters at hand—at Mahoning Valley, Delaware and Horseshoe Indy.

For a horseplayer, it doesn’t get much better than Breeders’ Cup Weekend. It was true in 1984, and it’s true now. For a tournament player, the anticipation is, I would argue, even more intense. Contests are fun even if you’re focusing on cheap claiming races, but when you can play against great players on the greatest races, it sort of brings out the best in all of us—and reminds us why we grew to love this sometimes frustrating avocation in the first place. 

Since we are running daily Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenges currently, we have seven days to recap. So we will proceed—more or less—in chronological order to try and provide one small measure of clarity in an otherwise hectic week.

The horses for the 2022 Breeders’ Cup were pre-entered yesterday, but the field for the 2022 Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge is still taking shape. That shape will change further this weekend—the final weekend of BCBC qualifying—with eight guaranteed, play-ins to the world’s most prestigious live-bankroll contest on tap.

Last week was a “Pick & Pray week” around here, so double-ups were perhaps to be expected among hot multi-tablers. However, a couple of players rode their heaters from one day straight into the next.

If you didn’t know that the Breeders’ Cup is right around the corner, you’d know it from the extra heavy helping of Breeders’ Cup qualifiers this weekend. We’ll have six, rather than the usual three. And even when the weekend ends, the BCBC play-ins will continue because there’s one set up for Monday as well.

It’s been quite a run lately for Bobby Shoemaker.

On Friday, September 30, he hit for $8,079 by taking the featured Friday cash tourney. His net worth increased by $3,359 the following Thursday after finishing first in our $6,000 Guaranteed Pick & Pray. This past week, Shoemaker set his sights on bigger game.

Not only is it not too early to start thinking about Breeders’ Cup, it’s time to start thinking about Thanksgiving weekend too, because this weekend we begin offering qualifiers for the Del Mar Fall Challenge (Saturday, November 26) and the Hawthorne Thanksgiving Contests (November 26-27).

It’s always impressive when someone wins more than one tourney on a single day, and Steven Meier was one of several who did that last week. It’s even more laudable when someone sustains their excellence through two days in a given week—and Meier did that too.