Charles Wallace Reveals How He Won the $100,000 Derby Wars Game

The monthly DerbyWars $100,000 Game is the pinnacle of competition for contest players and this month’s setting just so happened to be the pinnacle of racing for equine athletes and horsemen alike. While the best of the best were competing on the track, equally established horseplayers were competing off of it. The big names; Pletcher, Ramsey, Baffert, were sure to show up in a big way, but Charles Wallace was ready to steal a few headlines of his own.

The card was made up of twenty races, eighteen from Keeneland and two from Belmont, over the course of two days and Charles Wallace (Crw9700) put in quite possibly the most impressive winning performance ever in the history of the $100,000 Game on his way to a fifty thousand dollar top prize.

“I just kept telling myself try to stay calm regardless of what was happening, but it didn't work,” said Wallace. “I was a nervous wreck the whole 2 days . Getting the good start meant everything for me. I tend to get way to nervous if I fall behind right away, so the good start kept me somewhat sane.”

That good start came by way of three winners in the first four races for Wallace. Tweet Kitten (16-1), Race Day (4-1) and Liam’s Map (1-2) had Wallace cruising on the front end. Even in the race he didn’t have the winner, he ran second with Airoforce in the Juvenile Turf. At the end of day one, Wallace sat in third place and found himself just a slim margin behind day one leader Ryan Rapko (Chuckles375).

The target almost immediately switched from Rapko to Clint Littlejohn (Clintlj), who started day two with Hebronville (8-1) and seized command with the Turf Sprint champ Mongolian Saturday (15-1). Wallace, along with the other pursuers, continued to chip away at Littlejohn’s lead, but couldn’t seem to catch him until Littlejohn made a risky call to no avail. The BC Turf, featuring 4-5 shot Golden Horn and the BC Classic, featuring 3-5 American Pharoah seemed a mere formality for the favorites and a lead going in would likely produce a win. Littlejohn had it, but went against Golden Horn in an effort to close things out early.

“Conventional wisdom would say that with Golden Horn and American Pharoah as the odds on favorites in the last two races, I should take the chalk and make the field beat me,” said Littlejohn. “But my handicapping is anything but conventional. I felt like Golden Horn was vulnerable, and I was right. I took my stand against him and went with The Pizza Man. We all know how the story ends. I'm sure many of the players shook their heads in disbelief…”

Littlejohn was right. Golden Horn was vulnerable, but not to the horse he expected. Fellow European shipper Found edged Golden Horn at odds of 6-1. While Littlejohn was in disbelief, Wallace was surprised not that Littlejohn took The Pizza Man, but that no one leapfrogged him with Found.

“I almost took pizza man like Clint so that wasn’t surprising,” said Wallace. “Let's remember there were several players in distance of the lead if any horse other than the favorite won, so it was a very tough call. I am just fortunate the way it worked out.”

Somehow a $2.60 place prize put Wallace in the lead with a reliable favorite in the finale. American Pharoah, especially with the defection of Beholder and Smooth Roller, seemed like a no brainer. When Wallace picked the Triple Crown winner, his breeze around the Keeneland dirt course meant he had just inherited the $100,000 Halloween Game and the $50,000 first prize!

“It was a feeling I can't really explain that I had when it was made official,” he said, “but I hope to have it many more times! Besting over a hundred top quality players... I still can't believe it. I’ve never been a part of anything like this until I joined here a few months ago. These guys and gals are very tough competitors who I have loss to a few times, so I do realize how lucky I really am.”

“I highly recommend DerbyWars for players of all levels. There is a contest for every level and I love it. “