LEXINGTON, Ky. (May 2, 2019) – Scott Coles, winner of the 2019 National Horseplayers Championship (NHC) and Jonathon Kinchen, winner of the 2015 NHC Tour, will be special guests on NBC Sports Bet: Derby Special – this Saturday, May 4 live at 5 p.m. ET on NBCSports.com/Bet and the NBC Sports app. The 30-minute show will serve as a companion to the live Kentucky Derby television broadcast, which begins Saturday at 2:30 p.m. ET on NBC.
NBC Sports Bet: Derby Special, hosted by Ahmed Fareed from the paddock at Churchill Downs, will provide horse racing bettors with last-minute tips on the Run for the Roses, with topics ranging from the value available in a 20-horse field to the impact of the weather on the race to track bias.
Fareed will be joined by a combination of special guests and members of NBC Sports’ on-air team, including analyst/handicapper Eddie Olczyk, who last year correctly predicted the top three finishers in the Kentucky Derby and will offer up his full slate of picks for this year’s race. The show will run until the horses begin the walkover for the 145th Kentucky Derby.
Coles, a 34-year-old futures trader from Grayslake, Ill., became the youngest-ever winner of the NHC this past February when he bested 668 entrants in the world’s richest and most prestigious handicapping tournament. The NHC victory earned Coles $800,000 and an Eclipse Award as the Horseplayer of the Year. Kinchen, a real estate investor from Austin, Texas, captured the 2015 NHC Tour and is among the most successful handicapping contest players in the nation.
About the NHC
Presented by Racetrack Television Network, Bally’s and Caesars Entertainment, the NHC is the most important 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. There are no bye-ins to the NHC. Each year, the NHC winner joins other human and equine champions as an honoree at the Eclipse Awards. For more information on the NHC, visit NTRA.com/nhc.
-30-