Ron Watson topped a field of 680 horseplayers by just $5 this past Saturday to win the 19th annual Xpressbet Beat the Host Championship Round. He earned a $6,000 fees-paid berth to the 2025 Pegasus World Cup Betting Championship in the process, while six others picked up lucrative tournament prizes. Watson, from Michigan, has been a Beat the Host registrant each year since 2012.

What’s interesting about the top-7 of the Championship round is that none of them were weekly winners during the 8-week regular season of Beat the Host, nor were they top-5 prize winners in the season-long standings. In fact, only 1 of those 7 earned a top-3 prize during the regular season. Richard Dahlgren added to his Jan. 27 third-place weekly effort by finishing sixth in the Championship Round.

Watson put up $176.50 over the final 5 races at Gulfstream and first 5 races at Santa Anita on Saturday. John Caicco finished second at $171.50 as the only players to top the $170 mark in the $5 win bets of the Championship Round contest. Watson’s total was the third-highest winning mark of the season among the weekly winners.

Here’s how the top-7 played out in the Beat the Host Championship Round:

$176.50 Ron Watson
$171.50 John Caicco
$163.00 Daryl Schamp
$156.00 Steven Benson
$156.00 Robert Dietz
$152.00 Richard Dahlgren
$148.50 Conrad Hoetger

Players second through seventh earned their choice of tournament berths in the Santa Anita Derby Day Challenge or Florida Derby Day Challenge, each valued at $1,500.

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Season 19 Recap

The 8-week Beat the Host regular season saw 67% of players win at least one head-to-head weekly matchup against the rotating group of hosts from around the 1/ST family. Those weekly victories earned the Championship Round berths. One player, Alexander Bertram, completed the Sweep the Host bonus by outplaying the hosts in all 8 weeks, earning him $6,500 in prize money. He took down Eddie Olczyk in the regular season finale to secure the big prize. It’s the second year in a row that a lone player won the Sweep the Host, following Thomas Bassett in 2023.

The top-5 accumulated dollar totals for the 8-week regular season earned their choice of lucrative handicapping tournament seats valued at $6,000 each to either the 2024 1/ST Ultimate Betting Challenge or the 2025 Pegasus World Cup Betting Challenge. The aforementioned Bertram wound up third in the season standings and added to his Beat the Host haul.

$752.50 Kyle Newcomb
$631.00 Steve Terelak
$624.50 Alexander Bertram
$616.00 Brian Jones
$590.50 Adam Haskins

Players competed for $2,000 in weekly prizes during the 8-week regular season and we salute the individual week winners who took down the $1,000 top prize.

Week 1: Norma Mendoza ($257)
Week 2: Carl Baucom ($152)
Week 3: Joseph Piazza ($187)
Week 4: Kyle Newcomb ($214.50)
Week 5: Kyle Newcomb ($168)
Week 6: Rick Quayle ($164.50)
Week 7: Manuel Tolentino ($169)
Week 8: Steve Terelak ($119)

For more information on the season-long tournament scene at Xpressbet, visit https://www.xpressbet.com/tournaments.