Steven Crist

12:30 pm: Main track fast, turf good, two stakes races with fields of five and six, and a $44k pick-6 carryover for the first day of the final week of Saratoga.

1:00 pm: "Welcome back to Saratoga," said Tom Durkin, "where, astonishingly, the main track is fast and, not so astonishingly, we are off the turf..."

11:30 am: Hoping to be on the Thruway before noon and back on Long Island in time for the Grade 1's. Here are my horse-by horse comments and selections for the five graded stakes on today's Travers card. If I'm not sitting on a closed bridge somewhere, I'll be back to kibbitz the end of the card. Have a good one.  

12:25 pm: Five of today's six scheduled grass races are still on the turf on what's starting as a postcard-perfect Day 31 at Saratoga. The forecast:

11:00 am: It's a gray and rainy Day 30, nothing like the weather Saratoga might be facing in a few days but wet enough to make today's pick-6 with a $58k carryover -- and 5 of the 6 races scheduled for the grass -- an iffy proposition.