Saturday's Sixty Minute Six at Bel/Mth/Del/Pha/Bel/Del, with a $65k carryover from last Saturday's inaugural running, is all yours: I can't play it because I can't get past the second leg, a race that seems an especially poor choice for inclusion in a multirace, multitrack wager.
Here's the lineup:
The second leg, the only dirt race in the sequence, is a maiden-special-weight five-furlong sprint for 10 New Jersey-bred 2-year-olds -- every single one of them a first-time starter. If the race were the first leg of the sequence, at least you'd get a look at how the betting goes. But with the firster fest as the second leg -- albeit scheduled to go just 10 minutes after the first leg, from Belmont -- you'll be lucky to get one quick look at the opening betting and pick-three probables into the race before your Sixty Minute Six tickets are due. Thinking of betting more than 15 minutes before post time for the first leg? Happy guessing.
A race consisting entirely of first-time starters really shouldn't be part of a bet like this at all, especially when Monmouth had plenty of other races it could have positioned in this spot. Instead of carding the maiden race in the 3:50 pm slot, either of the two following races -- both turf stakes -- would have fit perfectly. Either nobody thought about it at all, or somebody thought it was more fun or more daunting (and thus more likely to produce a double-carryover) to include a race among 10 horses with no past performances.
Conversely, I suppose this could be the opportunity of a lifetime for someone who specializes in New Jersey-bred juvenile firsters.
Alas, no double-carryover on Belmont alone. Improvers of the breed bet $241k on Friday's twilight pick-six into a $38k one-day carryover, and one of them collected a nicely overlaid $177,832 for an $11.60/$5.70/$28.80/$11.20/$10.20/$8.30 sequence.
