DanG
24th January 2008, 07:12.04 AM
[Articles property of DRF.com and Dave Tuleys web site is at https://viewfromvegas.com/ ]
Horseplayers battle for handicapper title
By DAVE TULEY
LAS VEGAS - A field of 278 horseplayers will compete Friday and Saturday here at the Red Rock Resort in the ninth annual Daily Racing Form/NTRA National Handicapping Championship.
While 271 of them will be playing for the record $500,000 first-place prize, the other seven will be playing for that amount plus a $1 million bonus. The bonus comes from Churchill Downs Inc., which sponsored a tour in which anyone who wins one of its qualifying tournaments and goes on to win the NHC collects the extra $1 million, raising the total payoff to $1.5 million.
The lucky seven are Timothy Aupied (who won the Twin Spires Club tournament) of Houma, La.; Jeff Cookson (Calder) of Weston, Fla.; Samuel Guillory (Fair Grounds) of Beaux Bridge, La.; William Marsh (Arlington) of Oak Lawn, Ill.; April Scanio (another Arlington qualifier) of Brooklyn, N.Y.; Steve Stupka (Churchill) of Ankeny, Ind.; and Tony Taylor (TwinSpires.com) of Independence, Ky.
This is the third year for the bonus, and it has yet to be hit. If any of the seven wins this week, he or she also would take home a 26-by-14-inch glass trophy that has been brought to Las Vegas for the third time by CDI executive Jeremy Clemons.
All 278 finalists except one had high finishes in qualifying tournaments over the past year, including the final five, who qualified at the Last Chance Qualifier at the Red Rock on Wednesday. The exception is defending champion Stanley Bavlish of Virginia Beach, Va., who earned an automatic berth by winning the NHC last year when it was worth $400,000. So, in a way, he earned his way in as well.
No one has won the NHC twice, but there's about a 1 in 46 chance of it happening, because six of the eight previous winners are in it this year: Steven Walker of Lincoln, Neb.; Judy Wagner of New Orleans; Steve Wolfson Jr. of Holly Hill, Fla.; Jamie Michelson of West Bloomfield, Mich.; and Ron Rippey of Wayne, N.J., in addition to Bavlish.
Walker, Wagner, and Wolfson won when the top prize was $100,000, while Michelson earned $200,000 and Rippey $250,000, which illustrates how the prize money has grown.
There's about a 1 in 11 chance of a woman winning the NHC since 25 are in the field, including Wagner.
The finalists come from 87 different contests held at 50 NTRA-member tracks, OTBs, casinos, and websites. If you're looking for where the winner will come from, California would be a good bet, because 45 - or about one-sixth - of the players are from the Golden State. New York is a distant second with 26 entrants, followed by New Jersey (20), Florida (18), Michigan (15), Kentucky (14), Ohio (12), and Texas (11).
Second prize is $150,000, with third place being the $100,000 that each of the first four champions won. While prizes were paid to the top 20 in the past, this year 30 handicappers will cash with a round $1 million to be awarded.
The actual NHC purse is $1,017,700, as 122 people entered the $500 buy-in Last Chance Qualifier at the Red Rock on Wednesday. Seventy percent of those entry fees went toward the NHC purse, and $25,000 was needed to reach the million-dollar goal. The $17,700 surplus will be used for daily prizes. On Friday, the top scorer will earn $3,000, with $1,500 for second, $1,000 for third, and $700 for fourth. On Saturday, the top score will be worth $5,000, with $3,000 for third, $2,000 for third, and $1,500 for fourth. This is the first year there isn't a team competition.
Two of the original qualifiers did not make the trip to Las Vegas, but the NTRA was able to contact the next eligible finishers in their qualifying tournaments and send them to compete. Michael Garafine of Tinton Falls, N.J., told the NTRA that he has a fear of flying and tried to make it on the plane Tuesday but couldn't do it. He was replaced by Robin Buser, a lawyer from Delran, N.J., who was planning to go to Laurel on Saturday to bet the Sunshine Millions.
"I called my wife to scuttle our plans and say we're heading west to Vegas," Buser said. "We can go to Maryland any time."
Sean Alfortish of Kenner, La., didn't give a reason for why he declared himself from the tournament, but he was replaced by Bob Schintzius of Amherst, N.Y.
Each contestant will make 15 mythical $2 win-and-place bets each day, with eight of bets on mandatory races selected by a panel of DRF's Mike Watchmaker, the NTRA's Eric Wing, and the Red Rock's director of race and sports, Jason McCormick. The remaining seven races are players' choice from races at Aqueduct, Gulfstream, Tampa Bay, Fair Grounds, Oaklawn, Golden Gate, and Santa Anita.
Scoreboard updates will be provided throughout both days at drf.com and ntra.com.
Vegas, Reinvented Again
By STEVE CRIST
LAS VEGAS --As more and more Americans don't have to stray far from home to drop their money into slot machines, Las Vegas keeps reinventing itself to encourge them to continue getting on airplanes to fly here.
There was the brief flirtation with becoming a "family destination" in the 1990's, a concept abandoned when it became clear that families with children both annoyed the other patrons and failed to spend Vegas-sized money.
Then came the resurrection of the Sin City pitch, where what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas and visitors are encouraged to don wigs and fake names in search of random hookups.
More recently there's been a sideways expansion into nightclub-laden, hipster-friendly resorts away from the glittery Strip, the best example of which is the Red Rock, the palatial new home of the National Handicapping Championship, which begins here Friday morning.
The Red Rock, 11 miles west of the Strip and a $42 cab ride from the airport, was the most expensive off-Strip Vegas property every built when it opened two years at a cost of $925 million -- an astounding sum for a 450-room property (since expanded to 850.) It's the new flagship (and corporate headquarters) of the Station casino group, which began as a chain of bingo halls and was once known for its budget-minded casinos catering to locals. The Red Rock is a violent departure from all that, a swank yet consciously ironic retro take on 1960's Space Age modernism. The overall feel is one part desert resort and one part futuristic casino. The colors are muted earthtones, and the slots volume is turned down lower than the onmipresent trancey lounge music.
The NHC tournament players, who will arrive tomorrow, will find themselves in slightly nicer rooms than in the past and will appreciate the well-wired built-in workstation desks in the rooms for staying up and poring over pp's at night. The racebook, where the tourney will be held, is spacious with massive walls of projection screens. And it's right next to the 25-table poker room, the 16-screen first-run movie theatre and the 72-lane bowling alley.
The idea is that you never have to leave the property, and that's a good idea. Step outside and you feel like you're at a lonely shopping mall in Phoenix rather than in Vegas, where once upon a time the whole idea was to hit the sidewalks and the strip and cruise from one neon joint to the next. Now you might as well have flown to Dubai City or some other fabulous, self-contained 21st Century metropolis that looks like where people might vacation in a science-fiction movie. It's pretty cool, but it sure ain't your father's Las Vegas any more.
Horseplayers battle for handicapper title
By DAVE TULEY
LAS VEGAS - A field of 278 horseplayers will compete Friday and Saturday here at the Red Rock Resort in the ninth annual Daily Racing Form/NTRA National Handicapping Championship.
While 271 of them will be playing for the record $500,000 first-place prize, the other seven will be playing for that amount plus a $1 million bonus. The bonus comes from Churchill Downs Inc., which sponsored a tour in which anyone who wins one of its qualifying tournaments and goes on to win the NHC collects the extra $1 million, raising the total payoff to $1.5 million.
The lucky seven are Timothy Aupied (who won the Twin Spires Club tournament) of Houma, La.; Jeff Cookson (Calder) of Weston, Fla.; Samuel Guillory (Fair Grounds) of Beaux Bridge, La.; William Marsh (Arlington) of Oak Lawn, Ill.; April Scanio (another Arlington qualifier) of Brooklyn, N.Y.; Steve Stupka (Churchill) of Ankeny, Ind.; and Tony Taylor (TwinSpires.com) of Independence, Ky.
This is the third year for the bonus, and it has yet to be hit. If any of the seven wins this week, he or she also would take home a 26-by-14-inch glass trophy that has been brought to Las Vegas for the third time by CDI executive Jeremy Clemons.
All 278 finalists except one had high finishes in qualifying tournaments over the past year, including the final five, who qualified at the Last Chance Qualifier at the Red Rock on Wednesday. The exception is defending champion Stanley Bavlish of Virginia Beach, Va., who earned an automatic berth by winning the NHC last year when it was worth $400,000. So, in a way, he earned his way in as well.
No one has won the NHC twice, but there's about a 1 in 46 chance of it happening, because six of the eight previous winners are in it this year: Steven Walker of Lincoln, Neb.; Judy Wagner of New Orleans; Steve Wolfson Jr. of Holly Hill, Fla.; Jamie Michelson of West Bloomfield, Mich.; and Ron Rippey of Wayne, N.J., in addition to Bavlish.
Walker, Wagner, and Wolfson won when the top prize was $100,000, while Michelson earned $200,000 and Rippey $250,000, which illustrates how the prize money has grown.
There's about a 1 in 11 chance of a woman winning the NHC since 25 are in the field, including Wagner.
The finalists come from 87 different contests held at 50 NTRA-member tracks, OTBs, casinos, and websites. If you're looking for where the winner will come from, California would be a good bet, because 45 - or about one-sixth - of the players are from the Golden State. New York is a distant second with 26 entrants, followed by New Jersey (20), Florida (18), Michigan (15), Kentucky (14), Ohio (12), and Texas (11).
Second prize is $150,000, with third place being the $100,000 that each of the first four champions won. While prizes were paid to the top 20 in the past, this year 30 handicappers will cash with a round $1 million to be awarded.
The actual NHC purse is $1,017,700, as 122 people entered the $500 buy-in Last Chance Qualifier at the Red Rock on Wednesday. Seventy percent of those entry fees went toward the NHC purse, and $25,000 was needed to reach the million-dollar goal. The $17,700 surplus will be used for daily prizes. On Friday, the top scorer will earn $3,000, with $1,500 for second, $1,000 for third, and $700 for fourth. On Saturday, the top score will be worth $5,000, with $3,000 for third, $2,000 for third, and $1,500 for fourth. This is the first year there isn't a team competition.
Two of the original qualifiers did not make the trip to Las Vegas, but the NTRA was able to contact the next eligible finishers in their qualifying tournaments and send them to compete. Michael Garafine of Tinton Falls, N.J., told the NTRA that he has a fear of flying and tried to make it on the plane Tuesday but couldn't do it. He was replaced by Robin Buser, a lawyer from Delran, N.J., who was planning to go to Laurel on Saturday to bet the Sunshine Millions.
"I called my wife to scuttle our plans and say we're heading west to Vegas," Buser said. "We can go to Maryland any time."
Sean Alfortish of Kenner, La., didn't give a reason for why he declared himself from the tournament, but he was replaced by Bob Schintzius of Amherst, N.Y.
Each contestant will make 15 mythical $2 win-and-place bets each day, with eight of bets on mandatory races selected by a panel of DRF's Mike Watchmaker, the NTRA's Eric Wing, and the Red Rock's director of race and sports, Jason McCormick. The remaining seven races are players' choice from races at Aqueduct, Gulfstream, Tampa Bay, Fair Grounds, Oaklawn, Golden Gate, and Santa Anita.
Scoreboard updates will be provided throughout both days at drf.com and ntra.com.
Vegas, Reinvented Again
By STEVE CRIST
LAS VEGAS --As more and more Americans don't have to stray far from home to drop their money into slot machines, Las Vegas keeps reinventing itself to encourge them to continue getting on airplanes to fly here.
There was the brief flirtation with becoming a "family destination" in the 1990's, a concept abandoned when it became clear that families with children both annoyed the other patrons and failed to spend Vegas-sized money.
Then came the resurrection of the Sin City pitch, where what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas and visitors are encouraged to don wigs and fake names in search of random hookups.
More recently there's been a sideways expansion into nightclub-laden, hipster-friendly resorts away from the glittery Strip, the best example of which is the Red Rock, the palatial new home of the National Handicapping Championship, which begins here Friday morning.
The Red Rock, 11 miles west of the Strip and a $42 cab ride from the airport, was the most expensive off-Strip Vegas property every built when it opened two years at a cost of $925 million -- an astounding sum for a 450-room property (since expanded to 850.) It's the new flagship (and corporate headquarters) of the Station casino group, which began as a chain of bingo halls and was once known for its budget-minded casinos catering to locals. The Red Rock is a violent departure from all that, a swank yet consciously ironic retro take on 1960's Space Age modernism. The overall feel is one part desert resort and one part futuristic casino. The colors are muted earthtones, and the slots volume is turned down lower than the onmipresent trancey lounge music.
The NHC tournament players, who will arrive tomorrow, will find themselves in slightly nicer rooms than in the past and will appreciate the well-wired built-in workstation desks in the rooms for staying up and poring over pp's at night. The racebook, where the tourney will be held, is spacious with massive walls of projection screens. And it's right next to the 25-table poker room, the 16-screen first-run movie theatre and the 72-lane bowling alley.
The idea is that you never have to leave the property, and that's a good idea. Step outside and you feel like you're at a lonely shopping mall in Phoenix rather than in Vegas, where once upon a time the whole idea was to hit the sidewalks and the strip and cruise from one neon joint to the next. Now you might as well have flown to Dubai City or some other fabulous, self-contained 21st Century metropolis that looks like where people might vacation in a science-fiction movie. It's pretty cool, but it sure ain't your father's Las Vegas any more.