1. You're never going to get to the bottom of the drugs issue. Certainly it's a factor but no one can quantify it or frame it. It's part of the uncertainty we live with as horseplayers.

2. The word and the concept "bounce" is so overused that it's laughable. To use the example at hand, Afleet Alex did not "bounce". He got tired. He's not really a ten furlong horse, most of them aren't.

3. Too much time is spent trying to define races already run. Keep your eye on the ball. We're trying to pick winners. Using numbers as a tool is fine as long as you remember they're not definitive.

Based on his public utterances, I would have no hesitation in saying I can pick horses as well as Andy Beyer. And so can a lot of other people. Yet more and more, public h'cappers refer to his number as if it were some kind of absolute. I'm not complaining because this situation works to the advantage of people (like me) who ignore his numbers.

4. I said here once before it's more of an art than a science and on the day that ceases to be true the game's over.

5. One last thing - yesterday was wonderful. Not for me personally, I had the $37 horse who won the big turf race and nothing else. But for horseracing, it was a great day.

Not one of us thought yesterday when we got up that we were about to witness a $9800 exacta, a $133,000 trifecta and a $1,728,000 superfecta. That will make some new horseplayers - at least until they find out how tough the game is.