The Nomination Is In: The Del Mar Handicap G2

Mr. George Strawbridge Jr: Augustin Stables/Buffalo Sabres Hall of Fame

Welcome Friends to The Turk Blog, where I specialize in Turf Handicapping and Exacta Betting. Today I'm primarily focused on the big prize money at Kentucky Downs, but with an eye towards the Breeders' Cup I'd be remiss in not looking closely at The Del Mar Handicap G2. You can find my blog for Kentucky Down's Nashville Derby here.  

Do what you love.  I love Turf racing and luckily I know I'm good at it.  How do I know that?  I keep stats.  Do you keep stats of your own hits and misses?  I didn't start keeping good records until I started this blog.  When I was younger I was more instinctive.  When I started keeping stats I realized I was good at Turf and Synthetic, terrible at dirt sprints and turf sprints, and much better with 4 YO and Up.  My stats varied widely between tracks too.  I learned what I was naturally biased towards and I doubled down on it.  

I still love a good dirt race, and I'm not terrible at it.  One thing I have done for a long time is to try to insulate myself from the biases of others.  When I do handicap these big dirt events, I know very little about these horses except what I read on the Past Performances and what my eyes tell me on video. Try it, really.  It doesn't mean I'm not a fan of the sport.  Of course I get misty eyed thinking about Cody's Wish and the back story, but I'm better if I block that out.  Anyways, Lets get after this!

Del Mar turf routes over 8 furlongs: the middle posts (roughly posts 3–6) win the most. Outside posts (7 and wider) drop off sharply, and they’re especially poor at 1 1/8 miles. Inside draws (1–3) can be very good on days when the temporary rail is set far out (e.g., 30 feet), but with no rail the distribution is more balanced across the middle. Practical takeaway: upgrade posts 3–6 for Del Mar turf routes over a mile, be cautious with 7+, and give extra credit to 1–3 when the rail is way out. 

30 Aug 2025; DMR; DMR H G2; 1 3/8 on Turf

  Tomlinson and Beyer Review

US Timeform Early and Late Pace

So what to make of all of this? To me it's about the horses coming off of long layoffs: Atitlan (26 May 2025), True Quality (8 Feb 2025) and how they fare versus horses heating up with 2nds off like Balnikhov(Ire) (27 July 2025) and Gold Phoenix (Ire) (9 Aug 2025).  

 5/1/4/9 OVER 5/1/4/9/11/7 a $2 Exacta for $40. That's just a first idea, I'd like to get that below $24. Have fun friends, Turk Out!

The Nomination Is In: The $500,000 Tapit at Kentucky Downs

 

Welcome friends to The Turk Blog, where I handicap Turf Races and build exacta bets.  That's it, that's all I do.  I don't break news articles, I don't get interviews with the connections, no human interest stories, just handicapping (primarily) older horses running (primarily) over a route of grass.  Why?  It's what I like and after tracking ROI for 10+ years, it's what I'm good at.  I handicap in a complete vacuum to outside bias. I don't look at morning lines (until after I've handicapped), I don't read about the races in advance.  I study the DRF Formulator Past Performances and Race Charts and I watch recent/relevant video to help make the data more visual.  I like older horses because they are more of a known quantity, with plenty of data to analyze.  I like big fields and I like to bet against favorites  who still lose roughly 60% of the races they run.  

Kentucky Downs is my favorite turf track in the United States.  It use to be Arlington, but we know how that ended.  While its a short meet, I look forward each year to the chaos of large purses/big fields and just the excitement that this track brings.  

From the 2024 Meet:

There were 76 races in total.

• Favorites won 25 races, which is about 32.9 percent.
• Favorites finished second 13 times and third 7 times, for 20 additional in-the-money finishes.
• In total, 45 out of 76 favorites finished on the board, which is 59 percent.

There were 6 odds-on favorites during the meet.

• Of those, 3 won, giving odds-on favorites a 50 percent win rate.

For clarification, a favorite is the horse with the lowest odds in a race. It is considered the most likely winner by the betting public. A favorite does not have to be very short-priced. It could be 2-1, 5-2, 3-1, or any other price, as long as no other horse has lower odds.

An odds-on favorite is a special type of favorite whose odds are less than even money, below 1-1. This means you must risk more than you stand to gain. Common odds-on lines are 4-5, 3-5, or 1-5. At 4-5, for example, you would need to bet $5 to win $4, plus your $5 stake back.

In short: all odds-on favorites are favorites, but not all favorites are odds-on. A horse can be the favorite at 2-1 or 3-1 without being odds-on.

Enough of Professor Turk, lets get to degenerate gambler Turk!

While not relevant for handicapping today's race, I find it's always important to watch a race on this course to remind myself of the uniqueness of the track.

29 August 2024; KD Tapit $500K;  1 Mile 70 Yards on Firm Turf

Weather should be dry and turf firm.  Track website is substandard for horseplayers, but I think you'll be able to find scratches and changes here.  

Tapit 500K;  1 Mile 70 Yards on Turf

 

 I have some charts that I use to help me visualize the Tomlinson numbers for Turf and Dirt as well as Early and Late Pace. I hope you find them useful.

 

What to do with all of this?  You'll see in my Fair Odds Chart it's pretty clear I don't have a clue about this race or these horses.  I clearly don't view some of these horses the same way the Morning Line does, which is OK, you have to learn to trust your own skill, even if that means you have to admit you saw it wrong sometimes.  

 

I don't think I'm going to bet tomorrow.  I'm going to watch the races and compare my views of my base handicap to the results and see if I can't calibrate myself before the weekend.  If I want to bet, I can see a really simple Exacta:  $2 Bet 14/5 OVER 14/5 13, 9,3,6,7 for $24.  

Trust thyself, handicappers.

 And the following is a good overview of the track itself.  

 Have fun friends, Turk Out!

Updated Whitney Bet Construction

   Welcome Friends to The Turk Blog.  The Turk has his methods, and they work for me.  One of those methods I employ is to not allow outside bias into my handicapping.  Years ago I had a subscription to Bloodhorse, a wonderful magazine, and I would read about the horses, the trainers and the connections, and biases would form.  I'm a sucker for a good story, who isn't? I'm also a degenerate gambler and there is no place in gambling for biases because the horse is named in memory of someone.  I'm not a robot, I love a good human interest story, just after I handicap and place my bets.  Occasionally that works against me as I guess I was one of the few people who didn't realize Mindframe was going to be scratched. Generally I would see on my Past Performances "Also Entered" with a date and then I know its a chance, but this is a rare situation where two horses, trained by the same trainer, primarily owned by the same people, entered the same race planning to scratch one or the other.  I don't think it's good for horse racing for best not to face best, but whatever. 

The scratch changes nothing for me really and in fact makes my strategy easier.  Only one beast, Fierceness, needs to finish no better than Place, preferably no better than Show, and the exacta ticket gets saucy.  

7-2-3 OVER 7-2-3-5-9, a $2 exacta for $24 dollars.  It's pricier than I like or may do, but the handle will justify it.   Here's hoping Fierceness drops to Show. 

Turk Out!