Blog of a Horse Racing Enthusiast

Here are the 2010 harness racing leaderboards in North America. We feature horses leading in purses, the leading money drivers and leading dash winning drivers. Think you know who's on top? Some will surprise you, some won't. Find out right here!

Find out which horses, jockeys, and trainers are "in the month". Here is the 2010 purse leaderboard for horses, jockeys and trainers through April 11th. Some will surprise you, many won't. Check it out all the information right here!

This week I've whittled my Kentucky Derby short list down to five contenders. This year's Derby has a great field and I can see this going many ways, but if this past weekend's races (Blue Grass and Arkansas Derby) were any indication, a few horses are showing great improvement while others are falling behind the pace or not moving at all.

Like so many of the derby prep races the Bluegrass Stakes and Arkansas Derby gave the beehive of speculation a solid kick. Super long shot Stately Victor (40/1) blasted past Paddy O'Prado to take the Bluegrass Stakes running away. Line of David (17/1) wire to wired the Arkansas Derby by a head. About the only thing that makes sense to me is Stately Victor - being a Ghostzapper colt - would develop a little slowly and show up in the winner's circle late.

After spending the last two weeks gibing Big Daddy No Bucks on his short list for the Kentucky Derby winner hopefuls, I've been challenged to come up with a list of my own. I have to admit, I haven't had much luck at handicapping graded stakes races like the Kentucky Derby. Every horse that runs in the Derby is a good horse and while there may be certain horses that "stand out" on a good day, any one of them can win.

With the Kentucky Derby just weeks away, I thought it would be a good time to post the graded stakes earnings for the 2010 Kentucky Derby probables. As always these are subject to change, but they give you a good idea of what you may see at this year's Derby.

The Wood Memorial and Santa Anita Derby created as many questions as it did answers. At this time, Eskendereya definitely appears to be the horse to beat. Sydney's Candy won the pace less Santa Anita Derby commandingly even after stumbling out of the gate, but can he win a race with a demanding pace? And then there is Lookin At Lucky...He just can't seem to stay out of trouble, or possibly its jockey Garrett Gomez who can't keep Lookin At Lucky out of trouble.

While there may be a 3 year old that can beat Eskendereya out there I don't believe its in the six horse field for tomorrow's Wood Memorial at Aqueduct. Eskendereya's run in the Fountain of Youth (see below) was very impressive. He left a field that included Jackson Bend and Ice Box in the dust. If any of the five horses challenging Eskendereya in the Wood can race with Eskendereya it looks to me to be Awesome Act. Unfortunately there's no money to be made in betting either Eskendereya or Awesome Act, so I'll be betting on Schoolyard Dreams as a spoiler.

The 3-28/29-20 races didn't rock my list of of Derby hopefuls. Only the 10th horse in my watch list changed. With the exception of Endorsement's surprise win in the Sunland Derby the weekend's races were lackluster at best. Endorsement beat the popular derby hopefuls Tempted to Tapit and Conveyance going away. The DRF gave the spoiler Endorsement a Beyer Speed Figure of 101 as well (second only to Eskendereya). As a result Discreetly Mine gets the boot and Endorsement takes the number 10 slot on my short list.

We're about 6 weeks from the 2010 Kentucky Derby, so its time to wade through the derby hopefuls and start whittling down crowd to a few possible winners. Given all the major races between now and the Derby and the possibility of injuries taking some of my picks out of the running this list will shrink and change considerably right up to Derby day. I'll post my most recent version of my short list every Friday up to race day.