Winning Ponies

Jon Court didn’t waste anytime knocking off his 600 career victory at Ellis Park on Saturday’s opening card of the 2017 race meet. With his second mount of the day, Court captured the second race for owner Joseph Scates and trainer David Dortch. Court now has won 4,036 races in North America, He will tell us a little bit about of his long career in the saddle. Jonathon Kinchen of Austin, Texas, won four National Handicapping Championship (NHC) qualifying contests in his first full year of play and earned 19,026 points overall to win the 2015 Daily Racing Form NHC Tour, which ended Sunday following a three-day tournament at Del Mar’s Surfside Race Place. As 2015 NHC Tour champion, Kinchen earned $75,000 and an automatic berth to NHC 18 in 2017. He will join John in handicapping the races at Belmont Park this Saturday namely the $1.2 million Belmont Derby Invitational (G1), the $1 million Belmont Oaks Invitational (G2), the $750,000 Suburban H. (G2) and the $400,000 Dwyer S. (G3).