Friday February 15
Ghosts & Undefeated Streak Highlight The Rainy Friday
Today was an unusual day in that it started raining early in the morning and really never stopped. The weather played havoc with my selections as of my six selections four were scratched....two due to the weather and two due to the races coming off the track. But it did not detract from an exciting day at the races and a GRAND ADVENTURE for Kim and I! Far and away the highlight of the racing day came from "Down Under" where the undisputed Queen of Australia, Black Caviar made a triumphant return to the races in a race that was named for her.........
Black Caviar WINS 23rd Race In A Row!
But let's start at the beginning of the day.....After my first selection scratched out of a claiming event I had doubled the bet on #6 Starship Truffles. I thought that in spite of her having won eight of ten, including her last two here at Gulfstream, I might get a bit of a price as she moved into open allowance company. But when the program favorite scratched, she was left as the odds-on choice in the slop....and she romped home at 4/5. Whooo Hooo!
I did not have another selection until the 9th of the day. I liked Windsurfer who was a Todd Pletcher trained runner, and thus a Gulfstream Park Handicapper 40% Club play. She was coming off a layoff, but her last three Beyer speed figures were better than every figure earned by her rivals save two. The one was the actual program favorite, but his 1-for-14 record made me discount his chances; and the other one had earned a figure ONCE that would beat him....but every other figure on his resume was a good ten points below that. Autheticity looked much the best on paper to me....and he was. He pressed the pace around the first turn and down the backstretch. But on the far turn John Velazquez had had enough. He shook the reins and Authenticity was LONG gone under a hand ride winning with devestating ease!
The racing day was over, on "this side of the pond," as they say. Kim came home and we had decided that it would be fun for Valentine's Day to treat ourselves to an adventure. Kim had the idea - give her all the credit - and I'd made the reservations. In spite of a constant soft rain we drove to downtown Ft. Lauderdale and met with a certified paranormal researcher and took a three hour walking tour of haunted sites downtown. I didn't even know we had such sites! The rain stopped by the time we were about twenty minutes into the adventure and we had a great time listening to stories, listening to EVP recordings and looking at his photos of spirits captured by previous people on the tour. I would love to say we saw something, but we didn't. Still it was ghostly good fun! Go to the bottom of this entry to see two videos from YouTube regarding the tour.....if you dare!
We didn't get home until after midnight.....which worked out well for me. The brilliant sprinter, Black Caviar was slated to make her return to the races today in her home country of Australia. Now this brings a couple of things to the table.....first, Kim and I were actually in Australia last spring for nearly the entire month of March.....
And I had watched Black Caviar's last race, a gut-wrenching win at Royal Ascot. It had appeared that day that jockey Luke Nolan had eased up on her nearly costing her the race while in fact she had been injured and running basically on three legs, and STILL had remained unbeaten!
That had been thought at the time to be her farewell race, but six weeks after she looked so good that her connections thought they would continue her love affair with her home fans and began training her for today's race. In running at Flemington Racecourse today she was looking to become the first thoroughbred to win this stakes three times. Right out of the gate, as you can see in the video, she was just SO much more talented than any of her male rivals. She romped home in a course record time and her 23rd consecutive win in a row as my BET of the Day. It was a thrilling way to top a GREAT day at the races!
The Stranahan House (our first stop on the Ghost Tour!)
Broward Teen News Story on The Ft. Lauderdale Ghost Tour
Note: John Carr in the video was our tour guide as well
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