By Joe Quillen
12/13/23 – Tampa Bay Downs Race 5
Let’s go somewhere warm for today’s race as we head down to Tampa Bay Downs for race 5, which is an optional claiming $32,000 going a mile and a sixteenth. There are eight horses entered for the trip on the green.
I’m going to go with the 7 One Time Willard here (8/1 ML) as he will be stalking behind the leaders. It looks like the 8 Nautilus (10/1 ML) will be on the lead, and potentially, since he and the 1 American Unity (2/1 ML) have the same owner and trainer, might be a rabbit here, meaning that the 8 might set a ridiculous pace for his stablemate to win.
The 4 Eldon’s Prince (7/2 ML) could be stalking as well, after running on the synthetic at Gulfstream Park. He should be there at the end here along with the 5 Smart Striker (9/2 ML) who ran in minor stakes races at Gulfstream.
In the end, American Unity is the horse to beat here, and I think this gelding is going to have a perfect trip to pounce to win here, whether or not that rabbit scenario takes place. I’ll go 1-7-5-4 here, with a $20 win wager on the 1. Good luck everyone!
Tuesday result
The good news about a race running earlier in the day is that I can give you the result before I submit this article to get posted. The better news is that I picked a winner in the Tuesday race at Parx. Granted, it only paid $3.40 to win, but sometimes it’s about baby steps, even if I end up on a horse that’s odds on to win. I’m still down $160 in this series of articles going into Wednesday’s race.
Stats
Overall: 2 wins out of 16 articles (12.5%) | 2 wins out of 19 actual wagers (10.53%)
+/-: -$160 ($257 wagered; $97 won; $0.38 ROI)
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