Last year, Eric “Skeet” Boyd set a HorseTourneys record by capturing nine featured weekend cash tourneys. The remarkable showing of excellence and consistency led to him being crowned 2024 HorseTourneys Tour Champion.
Last weekend, though, Boyd enjoyed his biggest victory yet, taking home a total of $144,519 for topping a field of 286 entrants in the two-day Flo-Cal Faceoff—an event that required contestants to make mythical $2.00 win and place selections on each race of the Saturday and Sunday cards from Gulfstream Park and Santa Anita Park.
Boyd received $135,135 for doing best across the two days plus a $9,384 “Day money” bonus for having the best score on Saturday’s first day of competition. In the Flo-Cal Faceoff Boyd played two entries (the maximum permitted). One of those entries he received for free by virtue of his 2024 HorseTourneys Tour championship. That accomplishment earned him a $20,000 cash prize along with paid entries into all five contests that comprise the 2025 HorseTourneys Champions Series.
Boyd, 54, lives in Fort Davis, Texas—about 100 miles from the Mexico border—with his wife Connie Jo. He owns a construction company, serves as pastor of the non-denominational Church in the Mountains in Fort Davis (where he leads services each Sunday morning and a Bible study group on Wednesday nights) and he also presides over a good-sized farm…complete with cows, horses and approximately 60 goats.
When we profiled Boyd in a blog early last month, Boyd admitted that he played all HorseTourneys games as though they were Pick & Prays…simply due to a lack of time during the day. The same held true in the Live-format Flo-Cal Faceoff, in which Boyd entered all of his selections on the morning of each day’s races.
On Saturday, Boyd recorded six winners out of 22 races to build a day-high tally of $182.10. Kevin Engelhard finished Saturday in second place—which was good for a $5,631 Day-money bonus. Checking in third was Max Schnepf, who picked up $2,815 in bonus money for his Saturday efforts, while Mike Elsass ($938) ended the day in fourth position.
Taking a look under the hood reveals that Boyd’s Saturday success was supercharged by a six-race stretch in which he reeled off five winners. The five winners included the day’s two biggest—Mutaawid (an also eligible that drew in to Gulfstream race 8 and returned $66.80 to win and $27.40 to place) and Gulfstream Swale Stakes victor Gate to Wire ($29.20, $11.00) in race 9.
Boyd’s task of preserving his lead on Sunday was made more difficult by a couple of things. On his end, he only managed to pick up two place collections over the first 12 Sunday contest races. Meanwhile, Myles Richards—sixth after Day 1—found Sunday’s first dozen races much more to his liking. In the day’s opener he hit 10-1 shot Friolento at Gulfstream. Then a run of three consecutive modest winners—ending with the 3rd at Santa Anita—pushed Richards ahead of Boyd with just eight races remaining.
Boyd had an answer, however. His selection of Cheekiest ($21.00, $7.40) in race 4 at The Great Race Place gave him the lead back.
Two races later in Arcadia, Boyd really took charge.
It was Friendly Confines ($38.80, $9.40) in race 6 that gave Boyd a lead he would never relinquish. In the end, Boyd found himself flying the W by a margin of $24.50.
Speaking of baseball, Hayden Leibrock really came out of left field to grab the second-place money of $54,054. Here’s how Leibrock’s final seven races went:
Leibrock got another $9,384 as a Day-money bonus for amassing the best Sunday-only scoring totals.
Defending NHC Champ Mike Gillum ($5,631), Kenneth Mollicone and Shad Walton were the other Sunday Day-bonus earners. That trio, along with Leibrock, all finished strong with 15-1 Ghostly Act in the finale at Santa Anita.
Myles Richards played a fantastic tournament…keeping himself in contention every step of the way. He had $136.20 after Day 1 and added another $89.20 on Sunday to finish third and pocket $27,027.
Dylan Donnelly ($20,270) and John “The Clocker” Nichols ($16,892) rounded out the top five.
As for Eric “Skeet” Boyd, his 2025 has pretty much now picked up where 2024 left off. He now has four opportunities to become the first HorseTourneys player to win two majors in one year. And, of course, he’s now the only one with a shot to make history as a back-to-back HorseTourneys Tour Champion.
Boyd is now also in the early lead in the HorseTourneys Champions Series Bonus Standings. (The top 100 finishers each received points on a descending 100-1 scale.)
At the end of the Pick & Pray Classic, the overall points leader will earn berths in all five tourneys making up the 2026 HT Champions Series. The runner-up gets his or her choice of three such seats. The third-place finisher will receive a free seat into the Champions Series event of his or her choosing.
The next HorseTourneys Champions Series event is the April 5-6 Players Championship. Kevin Cox won’t be receiving a free seat into that tourney, but he can afford to purchase one should he wish to do so.
Cox collected the $3,266 grand prize in Wednesday’s $5,000 Guaranteed cash tourney, which ultimately paid out a total of $8,156. The star of his stable was Norfie ($30.60, $10.00) in race 8 at Tampa Bay Downs.
Thursday’s cash-game here was Basil DeVito.
DeVito came flying down from the top rope with Enforcer ($18.20, $7.40) in the 7th at Parx.
Terry Jerge’s best return on Friday came courtesy of Just Clarity ($14.60, $7.30) in race 7 at Aqueduct.
Jerge landed the up-top money of $9,351 in Friday’s HT Tour affair, our $15,000 Gtd. Pick & Pray, which closed with a final purse of $9,351.
We had a Keeneland Grade One Gamble qualifier on Friday. The $3,500 seat winners were Adam Lewis (4 wins, 1 place) and Matthew Kosco (3W, 5P).
Lewis and Kosco both connected with Solidaria ($19.40, $8.40) in the 8th at Gulfstream.
The Tampa Bay Downs Last Chance/First Opportunity Contest is coming up in a couple of weeks.
David Nelson (5 wins, 3 places) and Stephen McNatton (3W, 2P) will both be there for it. They, too, showed solidarity in their belief in Solidaria.
Charles Bernhardt (5 firsts, 2 seconds) swept the last four races to finish on top of the leaderboard in Friday’s $75 NHC qualifier at HorsePlayers.
Joining Bernhardt at the big dance will be third-place finisher John Marino…since runner up Anthony Spinazzola (our 2023 Spa & Surf Showdown champ) was already double qualified.
James Gjetley (3 wins, 3 places) used Just Clarity as his primary springboard to success on Friday.
Gjetley grabbed the $10,000 seat in Friday’s Low Ratio qualifier to the Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge.
Mike Lazarus didn’t ignore the also-eligible list while handicapping Saturday’s 8th at Gulfstream.
He had 32-1 Mutaawid in that 8th race en route to capturing Sautrday’s other HT Tour event, our $15,000 Guaranteed Pick & Pray, which closed with a purse of $25,564. The winner’s share for Lazarus came to $11,503.
Ray Arsenault will be headed back to the scene (or at least the city) of his greatest success.
Arsenault, the 2017 NHC champion, led the way in Saturday’s $165 NHC qualifier at HorsePlayers. Also snatching a spot was runner up Chris “Army Strong” Lavezza. He and Arsenault both had Mutaawid plus Gate to Wire ($29.20, $11.00) in the Swale Stakes at Gulfstream.
Another Gate to Wire fan was Matt “The Fly” Tietze.
Tietze took the Tampa Bay Downs Last Chance/First Opportunity qualifier on Saturday.
Jim Colbert reported home first in Friday’s $7,124 Big Bucks Pick & Pray.
Colbert won $4,986 thanks to Gate to Wire plus one other winner and two places.
Gate to Wire also was the highlight of Jim Meeks’s scorecard.
Meeks put up 3 wins and 3 places on his way to the winner’s circle of Saturday’s Keeneland Grade One Gamble qualifier.
Over at HorsePlayers, Jim Staub wasn’t rusty on Saturday.
Staub punched his ticket to “Le Grand Danse” in Saturday’s Low Ratio NHC qualifier.
Steve Pollack will also now be in Las Vegas in mid-March.
Pollack took Saturday’s $210 NHC play-in, an event restricted to those who had not yet earned a 2025 seat.
Philip Fairbanks (4 winners, 0 places) managed to smoke out both Mutaawid and Gate to Wire.
Fairbanks got a $10,000 Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge seat for the low, low cost of $179.
We don’t think Brett Wiener is a Chicago Cubs fan, but he had Friendly Confines ($38.80, $9.40) in the 6th at Santa Anita on Sunday.
Wiener will be in action in a couple of weeks at the Tampa Bay Downs Last Chance/First Opportunity Contest.
Wiener was also one of three $3,500 seat earners in Sunday’s play-in to the Keeneland Grade One Gamble.
The other two were first-place finisher Cal “Frontier” Jestice (4 wins, 0 places) and trifecta-completer Dr. Ronald Tang (4W, 1P).
The already-double-qualified David Browning and Brett Wiener ran one-two in Sunday’s $125 NHC qualifier at HorsePlayers.
That left the three guaranteed Vegas berths to 3rd-, 4th- and 5th-place finishers Braden Selvig (5 wins, 1 place), Frank “54-40 or Fight” Polk (4W, 3P) and Rick Vasquez (4W, 2P).
Sunday’s HT Tour event, our $20,000 Gtd. Pick & Pray, went to Anthony Mastropietro.
His big horse was Bunny Hop ($53.00, $15.20) in race 9 at Tampa.
Becky Mulligan also jumped for joy at the victory by Bunny Hop.
Mulligan recorded 3 firsts and 3 seconds during her winning performance in Sunday’s Breeders’ Cup Betting Challenge Low Ratio qualifier at HorsePlayers.
Amid all the other goings on here last week, qualifying continued at a brisk pace for next month’s NHC Last Chance/First Chance Contest. Between Tuesday and Sunday, another 44 seats flew out the day. Here are the latest to earn $500 places in the not-so-intimate gathering on NHC Eve at Horseshoe Las Vegas:
Tuesday: Terry Jerge
Wednesday: Vinny Politano, Kevin Engelhard, Matt Weikel, Terrence Frank, Geoffrey Schutt, Devanathan Murugesan, John Nichols and Todd Faro.
Thursday: Kris Andaur, Joseph Karabaich, Brendan Fay, Joe Scanio, Daniel Fischer, Mike Steindler and Matt Weikel.
Friday: Chris Podratz, Matthew Ache, Chris Weikel, Terry Bollom, Terrence Frank, Travis Allison and Gregory Lewis.
Saturday: John Nesploini, Ed Claunch, Gus Meyers, Patrick Runyan, Chris Inman, Gary Gristick, Mark Detro and Ilan Cuellar.
Sunday: Brett Wiener, Jose Giron, Dave Nichols, Stanley Bavlish, Bill Alberg, Ryan Tyreman, Martin Scaminaci, Ed Claunch, Gregory Lewis, Neil Thornbury, Mark Stovall, Dan Brockman and George Bosch.
Thanks to all of you who competed in the 6th edition of the Flo-Cal Faceoff or any of our other tourneys last week. Your business is greatly appreciated.
