I noticed that 19 year-old Steve Stamkos notched the ‘natural’ hattrick for the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday night. The natural hattrick occurs when a player scores three straight goals, without either a teammate or an opponent scoring during that span. Stamkos scored halfway through the first period, then twice in the middle of the second against Chicago, though the Hawks skated away with a 5-3 win. The natural hattrick is relatively rare in hockey – maybe it happens three or four times a season and in horse racing, it’s a pretty rare occurrence as well…though judging by recent events, maybe not as rare as we might think. On Valentine’s Day at Santa Anita 19 year-old jockey Joe Talamo won three consecutive races,and all at good odds. His natural hattrick started in the sixth race when he hit the wire first on 8.80-1 shot Sweet August. He followed that up by winning aboard Elegant Cad in the 7th at odds of almost 5-1 and completedhis hattrick with an upset score in the $300,000 Santa Maria H. Grade 1 Stakes on 13-1 shot Santa Teresita.A $1 pick three through all of Talamo’s winner returned $769.20, and if anyone had had the foresight to parlay $2 on the three horses, they would have ended up with $1788.00. The next day, Sunday, February 15, driver Randy Waples won three straight at Woodbine, taking the second race behind It’s A Good Thing, the third with (careful with the pronunciation) Logan Aas, and the fourth with Pacific Warrior. Unlike the Talamo hattrick, all of Waples’ winners were favourites; the all-Randy win three was worth only $38.55. Though, if you’d poured all that back on Waples in the tenth, it was a fine Sunday at the track. Randy completed an impressive four-bagger, capturing the $21,000 trot withSensual Hall at 14-1 and paying $31.20 to win. Then on Monday, February 16, jockey Garrett Gomez – who is on fire at Santa Anita – scored the last three races at that California track, taking two $150,000 events and the nightcap as well. His winners were all favourites, returning $6.60, 4.40 and 6.10 respectively and the pick three was a very unexciting $23.60.

And just to make this whole natural hattrick all the more impressive, I went to work at 680News…three consecutive days this week!

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