Claiming Horses Recognized by Horse Racing Website

Online, January 17, 2012 (Newswire.com) - The heart and soul of the horse racing industry is the claiming game. Claiming races fill the majority of races run at Thoroughbred racetracks every day from tracks like Aqueduct in New York to Santa Anita in Southern California. In these events every horse is available for sale, and thus can be "claimed" by a licensed Thoroughbred owner for a pre-determined price.

In effort to finally honor the most hardened warriors of horse racing, AGameofSkill.com has begun a weekly award to one claiming horse in the country that stood out for a remarkable effort on the track.

"The big name horses such as Zenyatta get all the attention," explained Rich Nilsen, the founder of AGameofSkill who has worked in the industry his entire career. "There is nothing wrong with that, but it's time to recognize the horses that do all the dirty work in this game without the fanfare."

This week's honor belongs to a true senior citizen of the sport. El Bomba, a 13 year old Maryland bred, won the first race at Turfway Park last Thursday night (1/12/12) and in the process captured the Claimer of the Week title.

"The race was a remarkable effort by the gelding who claimed victory in his 100th career start," explained handicapper and author Art Parker, who selects the claimer for the award each week. "El Bomba made a persistent wide move between the half mile pole and the quarter pole and took command just before entering the stretch. El Bomba actually lost the lead in the stretch but fought back and held off a pair of foes half his age at the wire."

The one mile race was for $5,000 claimers that were winless in 12 months, and El Bomba stopped the timer at 1:42.65. The winner paid $10.60 for every $2 win wager. The Jeff Greenhill trainee is owned by Sherri Greenhill and is a Keeneland September 2000 sales graduate. El Bomba has now won approximately $210,000 with 15 wins, 9 seconds, 16 thirds.