ESPN

It has been said that Facebook helped engineer the overthrow of a political regime in Egypt.

Yet every now and then some good can be achieved by simply raising a hand and talking.

To that end, New York racing fans will get a chance to speak their mind on what’s wrong or right about the sport on March 3 at Aqueduct when the Racing Fan Advisory Council will conduct its first public forum.

Actually, the event will take place in the Central Park Room (third floor) at the Resorts World Casino New York City from 10 a.m. to noon, but racing promises to top the agenda.

The Racing Fan Advisory Council was formed last September for the purpose of advising the New York State Racing and Wagering Board on racing and wagering inside the Empire State.

Among the council’s duties is passing along feedback from fans and the March 3 meeting should provide an ample opportunity to direct questions or thoughts to the council members, a group that currently includes chairman Patrick M. Connors, a professor of law at the Albany Law School, Michael F. Amo, chair and co-founder of ThoroFan, Allan Carter from the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame, and M. Kelly Young, associate director of national affairs for the New York Farm Bureau.

The meeting will feature opening remarks from council members, a presentation by the New York Racing Association, a question and answer session and a tour of the racetrack.

So, if you have a gripe, mark March 3 on your calendar, when you can also check out Hansen running in the Gotham and three other stakes (the Tom Fool, Top Flight and Kings Point) while you’re in the neighborhood.

And if you can’t make it out to Aqueduct, questions can be submitted via email to racingfan@racing.ny.gov.

Guess it wouldn’t be an official event these days without some form of a digital presence.

Racing stewards are a lot like umpires or referees. They’re usually at their best when no one notices them.

Yet this week a message sent out by the stewards at Aqueduct sent a rather loud and welcomed message. In denying a request by Dr. Kendall Hansen to dye the tail and mane of his reigning two-year-old champion Hansen, the stewards thankfully made sure the March 3 Gotham Stakes will be a horse race, not a carnival.

For Hansen, the owner, all the talk of using blue dye to give Hansen, the horse, matching silks, tail and mane was simply a publicity stunt and has no place on the racetrack. ESPN colleague Paul Moran eloquently wrote how demeaning it would have been to a majestic creature, and that’s just one of several reasons why the stewards deserve a round of applause.

Another key concern is what would have been next. If Hansen was allowed to paint his white horse, what would another owner do to stretch the envelope? Put advertising logos on the horse? That might be fine for a motorized vehicle, but not a living, breathing animal.

Dr. Hansen, in explaining his rationale, said it would create publicity and new fans for the sport, but that seems a stretch longer than Belmont Park’s. What kind of fans was Hansen talking about? The 6-year-old children who play with a “My Little Pony?” Is that really a beneficial demographic to pursue at the sake of the sport’s integrity?

In the long-run, it’s not about tradition. Change can often be good. This was just a bad idea, plain and simple, be it formulated in 2012 or 1812. Hansen’s proposal was so heavily tied to self-promotion that it could offer little of a positive nature to the sport. If anything it would raise the ire of more animal activists than it would attract new fans.

At least now, thanks to the common sense of the stewards, the focus of the Gotham will be on what happens on the racetrack instead of the sartorial splendor of Hansen.

We’ll see how the four-legged Hansen rebounds from the Holy Bull and the first defeat of his career. An impressive win would put him in the middle of Kentucky Derby conversations.

Another loss and Dr. Hansen will need more than just dye to create some interest in his horse.

And if Hansen wins, can we suggest Twitter to keep the good doctor occupied?

Or better yet, perhaps, if he wants social engagement, he can put together a fan vote to decide how he should dress for the race. Napoleon, a cowboy, Abraham Lincoln, an astronaut, Bozo. The possibilities seem limitless.

As a new era continues to unfold for the New York Racing Association, there are several ways to view the impact of the purse enhancements stemming from casino revenue.

Field size can be analyzed and a list of new horsemen can be rattled off, yet for handicappers the key question is simply whether NYRA races now offer better wagering opportunities, a.k.a. value.

That’s a difficult question to answer, since one man’s wagering gold mine might be another’s clunker. Yet a personal review of NYRA’s races since Jan. 1 reveals some positive signs of why a trip to Aqueduct has provided a much better deal than last winter -- and we’re not just talking about the buffet at the Resorts World Casino.

From Jan. 1 through Feb. 10, there have been 28 NYRA cards with 245 races whose cumulative win payoff was $3,050.80.

Meanwhile, the first 28 cards in 2011 featured 243 races with a combined payoff of $2,441.40.

Do the math and the average 2012 winner has been paying $12.45 compared to $10.04 in 2011, a difference that many handicappers may already be seeing in their wallet.

While a huge longshot, like Princess Reyana ($128.50 on Feb. 5), can skewer the results, a price that big does reflect some size and depth in a field which handicappers should relish.

Beyond that, though, there are some other encouraging signs tied to those payoffs. So far, there have been 29 horses that paid $20 or more compared to just 19 a year ago, making handicapping a much more worthwhile proposition.

Now that’s not to say there has not been a steady stream of odds-on winners as well. A year ago there were 51 winners that paid $4 or less and there have been 55 in 2012.

The increase in heavy chalk seems all together logical since the higher purses can induce a trainer to run a horse more often when it is in top form. Trainers are also more willing to drop or keep a sharp horse at the same claiming level because of the bigger purses.

But put it all together and it does paint an encouraging sign for both now and what awaits in the spring when the bigger outfits roll back into town. While there have been some awful races that would have a Belmont or a Whitney rolling in their grave, this winter has at least produced more races that a handicapper can attack in hopes of coming away with something more than a $3.60 winner and an $8.20 exacta.

It’s surely not Saratoga, but for February in the Big Apple it’s not bad. Not bad at all.

While the new casino at Aqueduct and inflated purses have created a buzz with most New York horsemen, there’s at least one trainer who could care less about what’s happening in the space that used to house the Big A’s grandstand.

H. Allen Jerkens, New York’s most famous and revered trainer, said he did not visit the Resorts World Casino before heading south in mid-November with his horses. Nor should you look for him there with a cup full of quarters once spring rolls around.

At the tender age of 82, Jerkens says more than anything at all racing is still about the love of horses for him. So, larger purses or not, he has no plans to abruptly leave Florida and chase the bigger pots in the Big Apple. He’s quite content to spend the winter watching his horses thrive in the warmth and glow of the Florida sun -- as he’s done for decades.

“I’ll head back to New York in April, like I usually do,” the sport’s living legend said by phone from his Florida barn. “I’m not changing anything. I’ve heard about the purses but I’ve never worried about them. If you’re not winning, the size of the purse doesn’t matter. I worry about the horse part of this game. That’s what matters.”

Jerkens certainly has not been winning as much as he did in the 1960’s and 1970’s when he was sending out paupers to beat the regal likes of Kelso and Secretariat. He has a stable of 14 now, and has won a pair of races during the current Gulfstream meet.

Yet those victories by Brampton and American Angel showed the master still has a winning touch, and the thrill those moments gave Jerkens was as emotional as ever. Be it a Grade 1 stakes or a claimer, there are still times when Jerkens’ pride can get the better of him and bring tears of joy to his eyes.

“It’s still such a thrill for me to be around the horses and watch them develop,” Jerkens said. “That’s still the part I enjoy most.”

Jerkens says he has no plans to slow down, that time has handled that for him. Outfits like Hobeau are gone, and he simply does not get as many horses as he did during his glory days.

His best horse right now is Bold Warrior, a talented 4-year-old son of Bernardini, who was stakes-placed at three. It’s a far cry from years past for a man who has won more than 3,800 races and $101 million and has been in racing’s Hall of Fame for the past 37 years.

Yet for Jerkens, it’s not about the number of wins. Or how much they are worth. Or if there’s a casino to generate extra revenue.

For him, as always, it’s all about the horses.

It was a warm February afternoon, one that felt like April but conjured up visions of May while shrouding March in uncertainty.

That confusing little time warp took place Saturday in the minutes before, during and after the 1:44.23 it took Alpha to confirm his status as New York’s top Kentucky Derby contender by notching an easy victory in the $200,000 Withers.

Following up a 2 ½-length win in the Count Fleet last month, Godolphin Racing’s Alpha cruised one step closer to the Derby by launching a strong, wide rally and taking charge in the stretch to win by 3 ¼ lengths as an odds-on 2-5 favorite ($2.70).

Realistically, with 44-1 longshot Speightscity finishing second, he probably didn’t beat much in the Withers. But with a runner-up finish in last year’s Champagne vouching for his class, Alpha certainly seems like one of the better candidates to be in the starting gate on the first Saturday in May at Churchill Downs.

“There are some good 3-year-olds out there,” said Alpha’s trainer, Kiaran McLaughlin, “and I hope we’re one of them.”

Finding out just how good Alpha can be might take a little longer than expected as McLaughlin said he would talk with Godolphin racing manager Simon Crisford before mapping out Alpha’s next start. The Grade 3 $400,000 Gotham on March 3 at Aqueduct seems a likely target, especially since starting spots in the Derby are based on graded stakes earnings if more than 20 horses plan to run. Yet McLaughlin also raised the possibility of shipping Alpha to a different part of the country, especially if Mother Nature issues some payback -- a.k.a. a couple of blizzards -- for all the nice, unseasonable weather in recent weeks.

“He’s here in New York right now, but he could relocate, or he could run back in the Gotham in a month. We’ll just have to talk about it. At least we got $120,000 in graded earnings going forward to the first Saturday in May,” McLaughlin said. “That’s important.”

What’s probably more important right now is for a 3-year-old to show some progress from race to race, and, to no one’s surprise, Alpha also earned high marks from his trainer in that area. Alpha’s behavior in the starting gate has been a concern for McLaughlin since the colt had a tantrum prior to the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile (when he was 11th), but Saturday, aided by breaking from the outside post, Alpha was a choir boy.

“He was great in the gate. We’ve been schooling him a lot. It worked out today. Obviously it’s nice to be outside, but at some point he’s going to have to be inside, so we’ll see how our schooling is working,” McLaughlin said. “I think he improved some from his last race because of how wide he was both trips. He gets a better grade for this race. If it was a ‘B’ last time, he gets an ‘A’ this time.”

And in a year in which the reigning two-year-old champ already has a loss at three, A’s in February just might pay off handsomely in May.

A chalk-fest at Aqueduct

As nice as it was to see three stakes on Saturday’s card, there wasn’t much value at the betting windows.

Prior to Alpha’s win at 2-5, Nicole H, a 1-2 favorite, made it 4-for-4 on the inner track by capturing the $100,000 Correction by 2 ½ lengths and returning $3.

In the Grade 3, $150,000 Toboggan, Mike Repole’s Calibrachoa took the race for a second straight year and improved his record to 4-for-4 on the inner track. Diski Dance, at 19-1 was second, while Caixa Eletronica, who was coupled with Calibrachoa, was third.

The Repole ($2.90) entry was also sent off at 1-2 and returned $4 as the front end of a daily double with Alpha in the Withers.

“It was nice to win the Calibrachoa stakes again,” joked Repole, whose 5-year-old had not raced since finishing third last November in the Cigar Mile. “He was a nice $40,000 claim [in Nov. 2010]. We wanted to give him and he ran very well. We’ll keep an eye on the other graded sprints for him in New York, like the Tom Fool [March 3] and Carter [April 7].

Overdriven to miss Triple Crown

Repole also said Overdriven, who was one of last year’s most promising 2-year-olds until he was taken out of training in late August, probably will not race until June at the earliest.

“Overdriven and Stay Thirsty [Repole’s Travers winner] will be sent to [trainer] Todd Pletcher’s barn on March 1 to start training. We’re looking at all the major races for Stay Thirsty, but Overdriven is more likely to concentrate on sprints like the King’s Bishop [at Saratoga].”

After having two of the top Triple Crown candidates last winter in Stay Thirsty and Uncle Mo, it’s looking more and more like Repole will only be a spectator at this year’s Derby.

Repole’s How Do I Win set the pace in the Withers but faded to fourth, effectively ending his Triple Crown hopes. That leaves only Our Entourage, who was fifth in last year’s Remsen. Repole said Our Entourage would run in a Florida turf race in a couple of weeks and if all goes well, the next stop would be the Wood Memorial at Aqueduct (April 7) as a dress rehearsal for the Derby.

The first Saturday in May has a special meaning to horse racing fans, conjuring up visions of mint juleps and twin spires.

But thanks to this year’s purse enhancements, the New York Racing Association was able to convert the first Saturdays in February, March and April into special afternoons in their own right.

Beginning with Saturday’s February fling at Aqueduct, the Feb. 4, March 3 and April 7 programs will advance New York’s stepping-stone preps to that famed first Saturday in May at Churchill Downs with cards featuring at least three stakes.

The key race on Saturday’s 10-race, 3-stakes card (two of them graded) is the Grade 3 $200,000 Withers, which features New York’s brightest Kentucky Derby candidate, Alpha.

An impressive winner of the Count Fleet on Jan. 7, Alpha has only one real blemish on his record, an 11th-place stinker in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile. Other than that, he was second in the Champagne and a six-length maiden winner at Saratoga.

The son of Bernardini had a sharp blowout on Jan. 30, breezing five furlongs in 1:01 flat, and faces a fairly weak group in his bid to pick up as much as $120,000 in graded stakes earnings, the criteria that can ultimately decide spots in the Kentucky Derby.

With Stephanoatsee, the Count Fleet runner-up, sidelined, the Kiaran McLaughlin-trained Alpha rates as an even-money favorite in a field of seven, and his price figures to be lower than that by post time.

King Kid is the second choice at 4-1. The Lemon Drop Kid colt was third by six lengths in the Gulfstream Park Derby, which started the 3-year-old prep season on Jan. 1.

The rest of the field includes Laurel shippers Hakama and Tiger Walk, the Dick Dutrow-trained New York State-bred Swag Daddy and Repole Stable’s How Do I Win.

Prior to the Withers, sprinters will be showcased in the Grade 3, $150,000 Toboggan Handicap. The six-furlong stakes looms a tag-team battle with Repole’s 7-5 favored entry of Caixa Eletronica and Calibrachoa squaring off against the duo of Flat Bold and Candyman E, the 9-5 second choices.

The stakes package starts with Saturday’s sixth race, the $100,000 Correction, a sprint for fillies and mares.

Nicole H, a perfect 3 for 3 on the Big A’s inner track and winner of the New Year’s Day Interborough, heads a field of seven as the 6-5 favorite. Winning Image, who set the early pace in the Interborough and lost by a neck in the final strides, once again looms as the main rival for the favorite.

Oh, and speaking of the purse enhancements, the Aqueduct casino has averaged a net win of about $11 million for each of the last three weeks. One can only imagine how much it will make when Resorts World actually starts advertising the place.

It was as inevitable as eventually finding snow on the ground in the winter.

At a time when the New York Racing Association is finally enjoying a great wave of success along comes a politician to supposedly set the record straight and let us know that all is not well.

In this case, it’s New York Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli who recently decided to generate a few headlines for himself by alluding to the new-found revenue NYRA is now getting from the Aqueduct casino and saying the group "stands to squander significant revenue."

DiNapoli’s desire for attention is, of course, understandable. DiNapoli needs votes to get elected, and comptroller is about as obscure a position as you’ll find -- except when they’re getting arrested, like DiNapoli’s predecessor, Alan Hevesi, did.

I’m just guessing, but it seems safe to say that if you start walking up down the Manhattan theater district at 4 p.m. asking people to name the comptroller of New York State you’ll probably miss your play before someone says “Thomas P. DiNapoli.” The next day’s matinee might be in jeopardy, too.

So, to prove they exist, a comptroller generally makes a blanket comment about a state budget being out of whack (thanks for the scoop!) or starts slamming on an old, reliable piñata to show how valuable they are when it comes to protecting the public’s interest.

For years NYRA has been one of those inviting targets for political pot-shots, and, quite frankly, it’s getting old and tired.

No one can say NYRA is perfect, its recently revealed error in charging a higher takeout on exotic wagers seals that deal. And some of what DiNapoli says is valid. But, in general, the points raised by DiNapoli are laughable. DiNapoli wants to treat NYRA like a government agency, and it’s anything but.

In reality, the last thing any NYRA fan or horseman should want is a politician dictating how NYRA treats them. They want to be treated like a customer and be rewarded for their business. They’re not taxpayers, forced to fork over their cash without argument. They can spend their money or bring their business elsewhere in a free country.

Being a business, which has wide-spread competition for gaming and entertainment dollars, NYRA needs freedom to operate in a customer-friendly -- not politician-friendly -- manner that will allow it to grow its customer base, even if some losses must be absorbed for a while.

Some politicians, of course, do not understand or care about this. They just want the money racing brings and figure if this or that gets cut there will be more for them to take out of the pot.

Given the government’s “expertise” in running its own agencies, like the now defunct New York City Off-Track Betting, it would seem logical to give some latitude to NYRA and allow it a reasonable amount time to right its ship with the casino revenue.

Instead, DiNapoli has sprung into action about a month into the new era, saying he’s fearful that NYRA will waste its share of the casino’s dollars, even though the money had already been designated for purses and capital improvements, not junkets to the Caribbean.

He also once again raised the possibility of charging horsemen for transporting horses between Belmont Park and Aqueduct, which is outrageous. Thanks to the inflated purses, long-suffering horsemen are finally getting a chance to make financial ends meet. And now, DiNapoli wants to pass along a new fee to them. Incredible.

Perhaps DiNapoli believes every horse is owned by a billionaire who can write off the shipping bills as chump change. But the truth is that stables, both large and small, will feel the pinch of that fee, and it could deter new owners from getting involved in the game.

Nor does it make sense to pass a charge along to horsemen when shipping is necessitated because NYRA does not have enough stall spaces to house every horse at the track that’s open for racing.

DiNapoli also brought up staff reductions, which in some ways is the last thing NYRA should ponder. The new casino is bringing more people than ever to Aqueduct, and, rather than trim staff, NYRA should look into employee raises to improve morale and adding people and equipment to make a trip to the Big A more enjoyable and comfortable for customers.

Remember, we’re talking about a business, not the Department of Motor Vehicles. When a restaurant experiences a surge in business, it adds wait staff and chefs. It doesn’t let people go – unless it wants to upset people and revert to the old days when customers dressed up like empty chairs.

A comptroller doesn’t get that. He doesn’t look at the big picture, and in the process he only makes the experience worse for the fans, who will eventually spend their time elsewhere.

Mr. DiNapoli, thanks for your concern about NYRA, but can you find a new piñata? Perhaps you can serve a more useful purpose in finding out why you’re called a comptroller. What do you really comptroll?

Racing fans can only hope it’s not NYRA.

If a national poll was taken on the nation’s best racetracks, it’s unlikely that Aqueduct would rank in the top 10.

From an aesthetic viewpoint, if you put the three New York Racing Association venues in a beauty contest, the Big A is the one that would finish up the track behind Saratoga and Belmont.

Aqueduct, quite frankly, is little more than a highly functional home for New York racing during its slowest parts of the year.

Yet if New York Governor Andrew Cuomo gets his way and Aqueduct is eventually closed to make room for a massive Convention Center, racing fans will learn the hard way that they’ve been taking the Big A for granted.

As much as the sport could survive by racing purely at Belmont and Saratoga, it will not thrive while spending 46 out of the year’s 52 weeks at Belmont.

Removing logistics from the equation -- it would cost hundreds of millions to winterize Belmont, where the grandstand is not even positioned properly to draw heat from the sun -- Belmont’s lack of a subway stop would make it a ghost town, especially during the winter.

A 10-month Belmont meet would also make the racing season mundane. While it may not match the excitement of opening day at Yankee Stadium and Citi Field, one of the cool things for fans in April is knowing the shifting of racing to Belmont, not to mention the arrival of spring and the Triple Crown that comes with it, is right around the corner.

OK, we’ll amend that. Looking over the Mets’ roster, there might be more of a buzz at Belmont Park than Citi Field this spring.

Yet, forgetting the Wilpons’ mess for a while, what’s more important than the way two tracks will impact the flow of the racing season, for its long-term good NYRA cannot afford to distance itself from the casino.

Cuomo’s interest in Aqueduct has nothing to do with racing or that Ozone Park is the ideal geographic spot to bring millions of visitors. At time when tax dollars are dwindling, his eyes are riveted on the dollar signs of the casino and the way it has become a magnet for visitors.

Right now, a king’s ransom of cash from the casino flows into NYRA’s coffers, but take away the umbilical cord that bonds Aqueduct and the Resorts World Casino New York City and one day another politician might start to question why so many dollars go to racing. With the obvious link between the track and casino erased, political leaders will no doubt point to the small crowds at Belmont and insist too much money goes to a sport that no one cares about.

That’s the way it goes with politicians. Give them the opportunity to divert revenue so it can suit their own needs, and they’ll take it.

Not helping matters is that as time goes on, Genting, which operates the casino, figures to have far more clout than NYRA because of the $10 million or more per week in profit it generates.

To prevent that imbalance of power from growing at a faster rate, the casino and the racetrack must remain a coupled entry. Even if the racetrack is dark for half the year, NYRA needs the crowds and activity that the casino brings, plus the revenue, and it cannot let its life preserver out of its sight.

Barely three months into the life of the casino, Gov. Cuomo has already showed casino cash means more to him than the racing industry by presenting a plan that would ultimately evict Aqueduct from the grounds.

Now just imagine the situation 10 years from now and the political pressures on the sport with the nearest track some 25 miles away from the casino. Believe it or not, you’ll miss Aqueduct.

As colorful and exciting as racing may be, there are times when it can turn dark and disturbing, with only a thin line separating life from death.

On a bitterly cold weekend at Aqueduct, the many dangers faced in every race by horse and rider were put on display through a harrowing pair of grotesque spills that claimed the life of two horses and sent three jockeys to the hospital.

Fortunately, none of the riders suffered serious injuries, but the next time anyone gets peeved at what they perceive to be an ill-advised ride, visions of what happened this weekend should put the challenges a jockey faces into a sharper perspective.

The first incident occurred in Saturday’s fourth race, when Scorper, while racing in about the four path, went down with jockey Alan Garcia. Quickly coming up behind them, Hardshell could not avoid Scorper, tripping over him and hurling jockey Junior Alvarado to the ground.

While Hardshell ran off after the spill, Scorper suffered a fractured left ankle and had to be put down.

Garcia and Alvarado were taken to North Shore University Hospital, where scans and x-rays came back negative. Alvarado managed to ride on Sunday’s card, while Garcia elected to sit out on Sunday and Monday with a sore back. He is tentatively scheduled to return Thursday.

The following day, after the field crossed the finish line in the ninth race, Raw Moon suffered a fatal heart attack and collapsed to the ground with jockey Ryan Curatolo.
Fundsalo Jones, ridden by Jackie Davis, crashed into the stricken Raw Moon, unseating Davis.

Curatolo was able to walk away from the spill, while Davis underwent x-rays and scans at North Shore that also came back negative.

Davis missed Monday’s card but she is also expected back Thursday.

"Her initial X-rays were negative, but she told the doctors she was still in pain, so they did a CT scan, and that was also negative,” said Davis' agent Roger Sutton. “She was hurting, but she’s tough.”

As sad as the two accidents were, there could have been an even worse catastrophe because of the size of the two fields. There were 10 horses in Saturday’s race and 11 in Sunday’s, creating the possibility for much larger spills.

On afternoons that cast a somber pall over a day at the races, that might be the lone silver lining.

It’s January, even if it feels like April, and with a new year comes a new array of Triple Crown hopefuls.

While many of the top-ranked 3-year-olds -- horses like Union Rags, Hansen and even Remsen winner O’Prado Again - are working on their suntans in Florida while they prep for their 3-year-old debut, here in New York the road to Louisville officially opened Saturday with the latest renewal of the Count Fleet.

Not one to be confused with the Wood Memorial, the $150,000 Count Fleet can be a stepping stone to bigger and better things, a scenario that may come to fruition through Saturday’s talented winner, Alpha.

At two, Alpha won at first asking at Saratoga and seemed one of the division’s better runners when he finished second to Union Rags in the Champagne. A nearly invisible 11th place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile relegated the Godolphin runner to the B List, but his 2 1/2-length score in the mile and 70-yard Count Fleet put him back on the fast track to Churchill Downs on the first Saturday in May.

“Alpha was just a great win. We’ll probably leave him there [in New York],” said trainer Kiaran McLauglin, who also won Saturday’s co-featured Busanda for 3-year-old fillies with Captivating Lass. Despite having two stakes winners on the card, McLaughlin spoke by phone from, where else, Florida. “We’ll probably go to the Withers [Feb. 4] and on to the Wood [April 7]. For sure we’ll have to talk to the Godolphin people, but that’s what we’ll look at for right now.”

Stephanoatsee looked to be a fast-closing second, but that was more reflective of the way the pacesetting Il Villano, who was exposed as a sprinter, tired in the final yards and was passed by the Graham Motion-trained Stephanoatsee. No one was beating Alpha, a 4-5 favorite, on this spring-like day in New York.

“Turning for home, he responded every time I asked him,” jockey Ramon Dominguez said. “He galloped out so strong that I had to get an outrider to pull him up. You always have to go just by what you have seen, but judging by today he should be able to handle more distance.”

And so, the Big Apple’s chase for the Kentucky Derby began rather fittingly with a horse named Alpha. Whether it will end with him is a question that most likely will not be answered until spring truly arrives.

If you happen to have a picture of Aqueduct Racetrack from around 2009, put it in a safe place.

It’s destined to become a collector’s item.

Those not so long ago days of Aqueduct masquerading as a ghost town are rapidly moving into the past, with the combination of New York City Off-Track Betting’s demise and the opening of the Resorts World Casino New York City making the Ozone Park track a red-hot destination.

And, don’t look now, but there’s more company on the way as NY Governor Andrew Cuomo wants to add a huge convention center to the complex.

Amazing, isn’t it, how the bells, whistles and buzzers of a slot machine can bring a business back from the dead as Aqueduct is suddenly as crowded as Saratoga.

Which can create a problem, that we’ll call the Yogi Berra Syndrome.

Decades ago, Berra came up with a funny yet wise remark when he uttered, “Nobody goes to that place anymore, it’s too crowded.”

There is some logic to that as the New York Racing Association, after needing little more than a skeleton staff at Aqueduct -- and Belmont for that matter -- suddenly has a small army of people to service. A visit to the Big A on New Year’s Day found long lines trying to get into the track’s parking lot and long lines at the betting windows.

In an era when it’s actually more efficient to wager online from home, the last thing NYRA needs is a deterrent to attend and bet on the races.

With a walkway between the track and casino now open and streams of people using it, a good resolution for NYRA in 2012 would be to spend some of its new-found gold from the casino on staff and equipment at the Big A to keep its customers happy.

Judging by the crowds at the casino and the construction plans being voiced by Gov. Cuomo, those days of spending a quiet day of solitude at the Big A are long gone.

It was former NYRA track announcer Marshall Cassidy who first gave the words meaning and context.

While calling the 1989 Whitney, the normally reserved Cassidy became rather exuberant in detailing Easy Goer’s victory and described him as “New York’s Easy Goer.”

He wasn’t the nation’s horse. That award, specifically Horse of the Year, went to Sunday Silence.

But Easy Goer was indeed New York’s Horse of the Year, especially since he notched his lone victory over Sunday Silence in the Belmont Stakes, right here in New York.

More than two decades later, Cassidy’s words can spark an interesting debate. Havre de Grace seems destined to be named the industry’s Horse of the Year. But was she New York’s Horse of the Year? Taking into account her only two races in the Big Apple -- wins in the Woodward and Beldame -- did she accomplish more in her NY races than anyone else?

Let’s ponder that, shall we?

As in any awards competition, there needs to be criteria to judge the candidates.

In this case, New York’s top races needed to be sorted so that graded stakes victories can be weighed and judged properly.

For starters, the Belmont Stakes has to stand alone and be an A -- the only A. There’s simply no way to top the importance and magnitude of a race that can turn a horse into a Triple Crown champion.

After that, sticking with 3-year-olds, the Travers deserves an A-minus. It’s not the Belmont, but it’s certainly the next best thing.

Behind the Travers, with a B-plus, come the Whitney, the Met Mile and the Jockey Club Gold Cup, followed by the B races: the Woodward, the Beldame, the Joe Hirsch Turf Classic, the Alabama, and the Wood Memorial.

All of the other Grade 1 stakes are B-minus. Grade 2 stakes rate a C-plus and Grade 3 stakes are a C-minus.

Now let’s put that criteria to work, giving us 2011’s Top 5, which will be delivered in a style borrowed from Dave Letterman, NY’s No. 1 talk show host -- now that Regis Philbin has retired.

5 -- Cape Blanco: He won the Man o’ War and Joe Hirsch Turf Classic, both Grade 1 stakes, making him New York’s Turf Horse of the Year by a couple of furlongs. You had to admire the courage he showed in winning the Turf Classic despite suffering a career-ending injury in the race.

4 -- Flat Out: He won the Jockey Club Gold Cup and the Suburban, a Grade 2 stakes. He was also second in the Whitney and Woodward and a victory in either one of them would have earned him the No. 1 spot.

3 -- Havre de Grace: Number one in the nation, but only number three in New York. She was a perfect 2-for-2 in New York, winning the Woodward, where she beat the boys, and the Beldame. That gave her two B’s, which is a better than average grade for most horses, but not enough to win this competition.

2 -- Tizway: The key element for him is that the Whitney outweighs the Woodward. They are both Grade 1 stakes contested at Saratoga, but the Whitney, which comes first, seems to draw a better and deeper field on a year-in, year-out basis. He was also an easy winner of the Met Mile, giving him two B-pluses, which would normally be difficult to top.

1 -- Stay Thirsty: And here is your winner, who gets the nod for his consistency in the year’s two biggest races of the year in New York. He won the Travers and was second in the Belmont Stakes which puts him right alongside Tizway and Havre de Grace. What vaults him to the front of the line are wins in the Grade 2 Jim Dandy and Grade 3 Gotham. Just to be safe, he was 3rd in the Jockey Club Gold Cup, which is quite impressive for a fifth line on the resume.

Put all of that together and Stay Thirsty ran five times in New York -- more than Tizway and Havre de Grace combined -- and won the Travers and two other stakes, with a second in the Belmont Stakes and a third in the Jockey Club Gold Cup, to boot

Stay Thirsty may have loathed Churchill Downs, but in the Big Apple he gets the nod from this corner, as being New York’s Stay Thirsty.

And what are your thoughts? Who would you crown as New York’s Horse of the Year?

Leave it to the New York Racing Association to take a piece of great news and turn it into a rip-off before the paragraph even ends.

What this centers around is NYRA’s announcement on Wednesday that it was lowering the takeout on trifecta, superfecta, grand slam, pick 3, pick 4, and pick 6 wagers by two percentage points, from 26 percent to 24 percent.

That might not seem like a big difference, but, as you should know from Jimmy Fallon’s credit card commercials, the extra dollars do add up fast, especially with wagers that can easily pay four figures or more. For someone who hits a $1,000 triple, for example, there will be an extra $20 in the payoff.

A $100 payoff will generate only an additional $2, but, again, for the regulars and high rollers, an extra 2 percent in their pocket as opposed to NYRA’s or the state’s can pay for a huge flat screen TV by year’s end.

That, though, was the nice part about a paragraph that ended with an explanation that the decrease was “to correct an unintentional oversight by which NYRA’s takeout for exotic wagers was one point above the statutory limit.”

That’s right. The TV you might get in 2012 was taken from you in 2011 because NYRA used the wrong takeout this year. Instead of a 25 percent takeout on the aforementioned exotic wagers, there was a 26 percent takeout, which incorrectly removed a dollar from every $100 worth of payoffs.

Sometimes when you win, you still wind up losing.

What happened was that in September 2010 NYRA’s takeout was mandated to drop from 26 percent on those bets to 25 percent. But for an unspecified and “unintentional” reason, NYRA failed to implement the lower rate and kept the 26 percent takeout in place.

To atone for the goof, NYRA is lowering the rate by an extra percentage point to 24 percent to make up for the additional percentage point it withheld for the last 15 months.

That solution would be fair, if everyone who cashed an exotic ticket this year hits for the same amount in 2012. That, guess what, will never happen, so some people are going to benefit from the new rate and others can kiss their lost cash bye-bye.

NYRA, in its own words, also said it would “address reimbursement for NYRA Rewards customers, holders of uncashed tickets, and other customers who can be identified through IRS reporting, within the time frames directed by the [State Racing & Wagering] Board.”

Again that seems fair, but if NYRA Rewards customers are reimbursed, what about customers at other large ADWs like XpressBet or Twinspires who have access to detailed account reports? They can list all of their NYRA wagers in 2011. Shouldn’t they be repaid, too? Giving back money to NYRA Rewards customers and not other ADW clients has the ring of a nice lawsuit to it, doesn’t it?

So while the legal eagles swoop in, there’s now an additional reason to bet on NYRA races that should offer larger fields and better value once casino revenue bumps up purses on Jan. 1.

That, on its own, is a very positive development.

Now if only NYRA can leave the news at that.

If you follow New York racing on a regular basis, then you had to get a charge out of Saturday’s $65,000 Gravesend Handicap.

Frazil is hardly a well-known horse among those whose involvement in the sport is limited to weekends and graded stakes fare. But for those regulars who spend Wednesdays, Thursdays and every other racing day scanning the NYRA entries, Frazil should be a familiar and popular old friend.

While the Gravesend marked Frazil’s eighth victory in 13 starts this year -- all in New York -- none of the other seven wins had black type associated with them.

His last two wins, which, coincidentally were his last two starts, came in starter allowance contests, the type of races made famous recently by Rapid Redux, Mr. 21-straight wins himself.

In fact, 10 of Frazil’s previous 12 races came in either starter allowance or starter handicap races, which are restricted to horses that started for a specific claiming price -- or lower.

For Frazil, these have been $16,000, $12,500, and $10,000 starter races, all the result of running for a lowly $10,000 claiming tag in 2010. They’re usually filler for weekday cards as reflected in Frazil’s 2011 dance card of three races on a Thursday and Sunday, two on a Friday and Wednesday and one on Monday.

He didn’t grace a Saturday card until his last start, when he captured a $10,000 starter handicap on Nov. 5 while carrying 126 pounds.

Now with a victory in his stakes debut to his credit, it looks like the popular weekday warrior, who never paid more than $5.70 to win in 2011 before his $7 mutuel in the Gravesend, may finally be a Saturday regular.

“I was really proud of him,” said Linda Rice who owns and trains Frazil. “Obviously, he’d been carrying so much weight for so long, the 115 [pounds] helped him. Today, everything went perfectly. I’ve trained him since he was a 2-year-old. He was a big, clumsy young horse. He’s a very big horse, about 17 hands, and we gave him a chance to find his way. He’s something -- he pins his ears back, his head’s down, you can see the expression in his eyes -- he’s a barn favorite.”

Judging by all those odds-on payoffs in Frazil’s past performances, Rice’s barn isn’t the only place he has been a big favorite.

Santa Claus may be arriving in little more than a week, but the real present for New York racing will come in about two weeks.

Once the calendar turns to 2012, New York horsemen and horseplayers can sing a carol or two about all of the extra bling that will be pumped into purses, courtesy of the Resort World Casino New York City.

January 1 officially marks the start of the purse incentives provided by the casino, but there are already a couple of places where you can find a preview of just how different things will be in 2012.

One is the New York Racing Association’s condition book for January 1-22. There you can peruse the official listings for a $60,000 maiden special weight sprint and a $67,000 non-winners of one allowance route.

In Aqueduct’s previous condition book the maiden race was worth only $50,000 and the allowance $53,000, reflecting how it will be far more rewarding to race in New York in the coming year. And, in case you’re wondering how any of that will benefit fans, with that extra cash will come more horses and bigger and better fields, which usually translates into better payoffs for value-minded handicappers.

Here’s just one example of the reasons why more horsemen will target NYRA races:

On Jan. 14, there will be a $7,500 claiming sprint that will carry a beefed up $29,000 purse. Under those conditions, a horse which is worth only $7,500 can bring home nearly $18,000 for winning the race. Even a runner-up finish will be worth close to $6,000.

With money like that on the table, horsemen will have more reasons than ever to bring their better horses to the Big Apple and hopefully that will inevitably end the days of four-horse fields with 2-5 favorites – or, at the very least, reduce their frequency.

While claiming, maiden and allowance races are the bread and butter of the sport, NYRA’s recently released winter/spring 2012 stakes schedule has also been revitalized with nuggets of gold from the casino. A total of 13 graded stakes will be offered through April 22, checking in at a combined value of a rather hefty $3.75 million.

The $1 million Resorts World Casino New York City Wood Memorial on April 7 highlights the package, though then infusion of cash has allowed NYRA to brighten up winter racing long before the Wood reminds us that spring and the Triple Crown are right around the corner.

On the initial Saturdays in February, March and April, NYRA has bundled at least 3 stakes on each card to create a quality afternoon of racing that might entice fans to brave the cold and head out to visit the new-look Big A and its new neighbor, the casino.

On Feb. 4, the Withers returns after a one-year vacation and joins a pair of sprint stakes, the Toboggan for colts and the Correction for fillies, on the card. For 3-year-olds at a mile and a sixteenth, the Withers offers a $200,000 purse and kicks off a trio of lucrative Triple Crown preps. The Gotham, worth $400,000, follows on March 3, and after that comes the Wood, giving Triple Crown hopefuls ample opportunities to boost their graded stakes earnings, which may hold the key to running in the Kentucky Derby.

Aside from the Gotham, the March 3 card includes the $200,000 Tom Fool, a 6-furlong sprint, the $200,000 Top Flight, a mile and a sixteenth test for fillies and mares, and the $75,000 King’s Point for New York State-breds.

On April 7, the nationally televised Wood will be flanked by the $400,000 Carter, $250,000 Comely, and $250,000 Bay Shore.

None of those days may be Super Saturday with its five Grade 1 stakes, but compared to past years, winter racing in New York just might be a hot item in 2012, all thanks to a casino that’s beginning to act a lot like a jolly old guy named Mr. Claus.