Venue for September 4

[JolyB]

It's closing weekend at Saratoga, and NYRA is offering what should be another strong program. While nothing can come close to matching last Saturday, we will get to handicap [among other races] The Flower Bowl, The Jockey Club Gold Cup, the Prioress and the Saranac.

Entries won't be out until later today, so I'll wait to finalize the selection until then. I just wanted to provide an early alert to any who wanted a head start.

[DonGuido]

Nice REPEAT JB. Looks like your back in your stride again!!!

[RUFFIAN]

AH YES ~ JOCKEY CLUB GOLD CUP ��

Brings back fond memories when Carolyn Hine
Sent Me SKIP AWAY SHOE FROM His Gold Cup ��

He appears in My Own Book
YA WIN SOME ~ YA LOSE SOME

When I wrote to her requesting 8 x 10 photos
She not only sent those but she also sent his JCGC SHOE

Her letters were always handwritten
She was always so gracious and complementary to me

I cried when she lost “Skippy “ to Stud at another location
I cried even more when Sonny died ��

They were always together holding hands
And after winning $1 million race
They went to eat dinner at Denny’s


Carolyn Hine
was also honored with an Eclipse as outstanding owner.
As good as he was at ages 3 and 4, Skip Away saved the best for last
. In his final year of racing, at age 5, Skippy won JCGC ��

[JolyB]

Ruff, you probably remember the Jockey Club Gold Cup as a Belmont race, very often the feature race on one of the Belmont cards that served as final preps leading up to the BC races. I think that this is the first year that the JCGC has run at Saratoga, serving as the feature to the closing weekend card.

The JCGC has had some illustrious winners including Pleasant Tap, Cigar, Mineshaft, Bernardini and Curlin [twice]. But the highest Equibase speed rating that has been awarded for the JCGC since they started doing so in 1992 was for Skip Away's second win in 1997, an astronomical 135.

[JolyB]

Final Venue selection: Saratoga, but starting with race 3 through the completion of the card, which is race 12. Post time for race 3 will be 1:43 PM Eastern time.

Hope that you enjoy the day as the Saratoga season draws to a close.