Why is it that without fail I am always fond of horses with the word Zip in their name? Just the curse of having a last name like Zipse, I guess. Today we saw another big performance from one of those Zips, as the newly turned five-year-old mare, Unzip Me, proved too much for her competition in the Monrovia Stakes at Santa Anita. Sent off as the 7-10 choice in the strong field that included Evening Jewel, Unzip Me rolled out of the gate on the downhill turf course. Opening a one length lead early on, she allowed for her competition to get close to her on the turn for home. This proved to be only a temporary situation as Unzip Me undressed her female foes with another burst of speed down the grassy lane. She stopped the timer in a snappy 1:12.72 for the 6 ½ furlongs. It was the third stakes win in the last four starts for the daughter of City Zip, with only an excellent 3rd against the boys in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint getting in the way of her win streak. Because of today’s effort, I am pleased to announce that Unzip Me is ZATT’s Star of the Week.
Don’t you just hate when people talk about how much money they make? Yeah, me too. But in the world of thoroughbred horse racing, it’s not considered in bad taste to do so. With that in mind, I Congratulate the year-end champions in the total earnings races for 2010. Among the horses, it was Blame on the track with $3,751,467, and in the breeding shed it was Giant’s Causeway with $8,806,163. Ramon Dominguez won a tight jockey race with $16,911,880, while Todd Pletcher did it again as top trainer with $23,157,098. WinStar Farm not only won two-thirds of the Triple Crown, but also topped the owner’s list with $5,183,379. I have no idea who the highest paid turf writer was.
Does anyone want to hear my bad beat of all bad beats story from New Year’s Day? I liked the Stage Door Betty yesterday as a betting race, because I did not like the favorite and I liked a few horses quite a bit including longshot Joanie’s Catch. With several complete tosses in the large field, I saw a big superfecta opportunity. I bet $28 worth of superfectas keying the three horses for 1st and 2nd. It was my only major play of the day, and I was thrilled to see my top three run 1-2-3. It was perfect. The other horses I chose to include ran 4-5-6. It was as right about a race as I had ever been. My 40 cent winning combination of 1-10-8-6 returned just over $1,300. Or at least that is what I thought. Somehow my ticket had a 2 (One of those complete tosses) where the 6 should have been. I cashed nothing in a race where the three horses I liked ran 1-2-3 at 3-1, 18-1, and 6-1. The moral of this story is either to always double check those tickets, or not to put all your eggs in the Superfecta basket. Either way, it was a tough one to swallow. Don’t feel bad ladies and gentleman, we all do it sometimes. At least I got rid of mine on the first day of the year.