Here it is less than a couple of weeks from Breeders Cup day, and already I'm eyeing the ATM machine.

The Breeders Cup parade of champions is the highlight of the year for handicappers raised in Kentucky, New York, California and Florida.

For horse players who grew up in Nebraska and Oklahoma, Cup Day is a frightening prospect.

Simply put, the horses are too good.

Put another way, where are all the front wraps?

Let's see, with whom shall we bet the recreation money here, the horse that has won five in a row, or the horse that has won three out of four with trouble on the second-place finish, or the horse that has won two in a row after the layoff, before which it had won three in a row?

Where's the one-legged jock when you need him?

I grew up at tracks where the psychological edge was every bit as important as physical elements of racing.

Forget post position and early speed.

In the next race, a mother and her son each had rides!

I can count on one hand the number of times Junior tried to knock Mom into the infield.

It's not that hard to separate what's decent from what's poor, either in the Racing Form or in the paddock.

Tired and sore has a particular look to it, a dull cast, a flatness to the step that seems to say: I'd rather be home.

But on Cup Day, they all want to run.

They're all beautiful.

It's like trying to handicap the Miss America Pageant where all but an entry or two from one of the lost states seem headed for a photo finish.

On Breeders Cup day, the handicapper is asked to separate perfection from greatness and rapidly improving brilliance.

I have had success with one handicapping tool honed down through the years at places like Blue Ribbon Downs near some Oklahoma badlands. There, a maiden might visit both the inside and the outside rails on a single trip: Supplementary entries do well at the Breeders Cup.

Money talks, even where the grammar might be debatable.

Most nights before Cup Days, I'd spend hours looking for what's current without being too current, which could elevate a horse's status from near-perfection.

The year before last, I cashed no winning tickets on the Breeders Cup races.

I can't imagine why I was experiencing difficulty interpreting a turf race that had come down a steep hill on a race course in England. But such was the case.

An unwritten rule of horse playing is the teller doesn't talk about a customer's luck.

But as this particular Breeders Cup day wore on, and as my muscularly chiseled and full-of-form horses ran stylishly up the track, the tellers began avoiding my glance when I showed up to pick another loser.

It was like I was there to look at caskets.

Tellers love me. I tip. Before and after Breeders Cup day. On this occasion, a teller's brow would furrow before I announced my selection. A chin would quiver with emotion afterward.

Toward the end of the afternoon, somebody in the restroom said he had heard I was having a tough day.

I don't know what goes on in the racetrack restroom for women.

But in the racetrack restroom for men, there originated a popular phrase whose second part has to do with "moaning."

In a racetrack restroom for men, strangers speak to other strangers as though they had known each other for years.

I asked the man for the identity of the person who had told him I was having a tough day. He said it was all around the building.

This brings us to the key question in any type of horse racing: Where's the money?

The week before the Cup, while everybody else is guessing wildly and praying, I'll come as close to guaranteeing some picks as can be done under the difficult circumstances.

I'll pick the losers especially for you.