The year’s first Free-to-Play online National Horseplayers Championship (NHC) qualifier is set for Sunday on HorsePlayers.com, the new official qualifying site for the world’s richest and most prestigious handicapping tournament. The contest offers five berths to January’s NHC and is open exclusively to NHC Tour members. NHC 18 in January offered a record prize pool worth more than $2.9 million, including an $800,000 first-place prize won by Ray Arsenault, whose finish also earned him an Eclipse Award as Horseplayer of the Year.
To register for Sunday’s free contest, visit horseplayers.com/contest/201423. To sign up for the NHC Tour, go to www.ntra.com/membership. One must be a current NHC Tour member to play in free online qualifiers.
The top five finishers in Sunday’s contest (one more than in each of last year’s free online qualifiers) will each earn an automatic berth to the NTRA National Horseplayers Championship Presented by Racetrack Television Network, STATS Race Lens™ and Treasure Island Las Vegas, to be held February 9-11, 2018, at Treasure Island. Each winning prize package includes NHC entry, four nights at Treasure Island and airfare reimbursement up to $400.
The free qualifier also offers NHC Tour points, with the top 10 percent of finishers earning shares of a points pool estimated at 250,000 points (with 3,750 to the winner), based on an estimated 1,500 players. The final number of points available will be determined on a sliding scale according to the number of participating NHC Tour players. Current NHC Tour standings can be found on the LUXAIR JETS NHC Tour Leaderboard at www.ntra.com/nhc/leaders.
The contest will be comprised of mythical Win and Place wagers on 12 mandatory races across the country with selections submitted in advance of the first designated contest race per the “Pick and Pray” format. Contest races will be posted Friday afternoon.
This marks the first of five free online qualifiers to be presented by the NTRA this year on HorsePlayers.com, with the later contests set for May 13, June 10, July 30, and Sept. 2. The 2017 NHC Tour is the richest in history with $400,000 in prize money, including $100,000 to the overall leader at the conclusion of the Tour season.
For more information on the NHC and NHC Tour, visit www.ntra.com/nhc.
About the National Horseplayers Championship
In its 19th year, the NTRA National Horseplayers Championship (formerly known as the NTRA National Handicapping Championship) is presented by Racetrack Television Network, STATS Race Lens™ and Treasure Island Las Vegas. Equibase is the official data provider of the NHC and NHC Tour. The NHC is world’s richest and most prestigious handicapping tournament of the year for horseplayers and is the culmination of a year-long series of NTRA-sanctioned local tournaments conducted by racetracks, casino race books, off-track betting facilities and horse racing and handicapping websites, each of which sends its top qualifiers to the national finals. Each year, the NHC winner joins other human and equine champions as an honoree at the Eclipse Awards. The most recent NHC offered record prize money and awards totaling more than $2.9 million. NHC 19 will be held February 9-11, 2018, at Treasure Island Las Vegas.