Many of these contest players are phonies

I remember five years ago, I used to look up to a lot of these contest players. I saw the names, the tournament wins, the repeated NHC appearances, and figured these had to be some of the sharpest minds in horse racing. When you see someone qualifying year after year and holding up those big checks, it’s easy to assume they have the game figured out.

Then someone I know and respect, someone I consider one of the best in the game, told me something that stuck with me. He said, “Some of these guys aren’t as great as you think. They just have a lot more money to keep trying.”

At first, I thought that was a little harsh. But it made me start looking at the whole picture instead of just the results people wanted everyone to see.

Someone can tell me they’ve qualified for the NHC 15 times, and my first question now is how much they spent getting there. How many contests did they enter? How many entries did they buy? What did they collect along the way, and what did they actually keep after the expenses?

Those are fair questions. If we’re going to use contest results as proof that someone is a great horseplayer, the money going out has to matter just as much as the money coming in.

What gets posted is the winning ticket, the big check, the qualifying spot, and the congratulations. What you rarely see is a full accounting of everything it took to get that result. Without that, how would any of us know whether we’re looking at a profitable player or someone who can afford a very expensive hobby?

A big bankroll gives you room to keep taking shots. You can have a bad weekend, a bad month, or a long stretch of unsuccessful entries and still come right back for more. Someone working with a limited bankroll doesn’t have that same luxury. Eventually, they have to stop and think about what another attempt is going to cost them.

And yes, there’s skill in contest play. Knowing when to protect your position, when to take a chance, and when you need a price is part of winning. I’m not taking that away from anybody. But I also think people confuse being a good contest player with being a great handicapper.

A horse you use because you need a huge price to climb a leaderboard isn’t necessarily a horse you would recommend to someone betting their own money on that race. The contest situation can make that selection perfectly reasonable. It still doesn’t mean you uncovered some brilliant opinion that everyone else missed.

That’s where my view has changed the most. I used to see a contest résumé and automatically give someone’s handicapping opinions more weight. Then you spend time talking races with people, listening to how they evaluate horses and explain their selections, and sometimes the reputation is a lot more impressive than the actual conversation.

There are excellent handicappers who play contests, and they deserve their credit. But I’m no longer automatically impressed by how many times someone has qualified without knowing how many attempts it took and what the overall results look like.

Tell me what you won, sure. Just tell me what you spent, too.

Five years ago, I probably wouldn’t have asked. Today, that’s one of the first things I want to know.