Open Writing

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I got a horse right here, his name is Paul Revere and here's a guy who says if the weather's clear, can do, can do. This guy says the horse can do. If he says the horse can do, can do.

These words, borrowed from that wonderful trio “Fugue For Tin Horns,” featured in the splendid Broadway musical, “Guys and Dolls,” immediately conveys to me the vagaries of the horse-racing world. It’s a hidden world to the majority of us, incomprehensible to most non-gamblers, and full of contradictions. Known as “The Sport of Kings,” it’s doubtful how many kings actually are or have ever been involved, and in truth the sport is more defined by the humble punter than any noble patronage.

If you listen to the experts: the trainers, the jockeys and the breeders, they would have you believe that the breeding and racing of horses is very scientific. The way I see it, it’s the most intuitive and empirical undertaking imaginable. I knew a man who bred racehorses in a small way, and through that relationship gained an insight into the “science.” On one occasion, he took me through the stables and saddling enclosure at the Keystone track in Philadelphia.

As we walked along the rows of stalls, I observed one horse with its head over a bucket from which smoke was rising. In answer to my obvious curiosity I was told that the bucket contained marijuana to calm the animal, which apparently suffered with pre-race jitters. In another stall a horse was standing with its front feet in a bath of ice. When I enquired if the animal had suffered an injury, I was assured that it was perfectly healthy but ran better after the ice-bath treatment!
That same day, my breeder friend had a horse running that was a “sure-fire winner.” I placed a small bet, not being much of a gambler, but encouraged by the knowledge that I had “inside information.” True to my friend’s confidence, the horse led through much of the race, then dropped dead just a few yards before the finish post – the story of my gambling career.

The gambling side of horseracing is yet another arcane world. The real punters study form so intensively they can tell you the life history of any given horse, or any jockey’s performance. But the problem with trying to evaluate the expertise of punters is that they never tell you when they lose, and would always have you believe that, over time, they’re ahead of the game.

I grew up around people who “played the horses;” my maternal grandfather and my father in particular, so I know the cold truth, and with great certitude I can say that the only winners are the bookies. In my twenties I decided that if I used my analytical training to gamble on racehorses, even though I wasn’t deluded by the idea of easy money, I could probably make a bit on the side. If I did well I’d persist, and if not then I’d quit.

For much of the season I kept my head above water. I couldn’t have lived off my winnings, but at least I wasn’t out of pocket, so I was encouraged. Late in the season there was a three horse race with an odds-on favorite ridden by England’s premier jockey, Lester Piggott. There seemed to be no way to lose. So even though the winnings wouldn’t have amounted to much, I put my whole bundle on Piggott’s mount. Just out of the starting gate it turned around and ran the wrong way!

When I related my misfortune to some of the experienced punters I had come to know and disdain, they were aghast. “You did what?” they gasped. “Don’t you know that in a three horse race you always…?” At that point they launched into a gambling algorithm that I was incapable of understanding then, and therefore cannot retell now. In essence, anyone with the least amount of gambling savvy knows that you bet on all three horses in such a way that you cannot do worse than break even.

After that experience I concluded that even though punters are not very scientific, they’re a lot smarter than me, and decided my betting days were over. While on a visit to England some years later I broke my resolve to never again play the horses. One of my daughters and her avid punter husband decided they would treat my wife and I to a day at the races. Since my son-in-law was “the expert,” we decided to follow his lead in placing bets. In race after race, the horses he picked didn’t even come close to being placed, never mind win.

Meanwhile, my daughter, who had decided to make her own choices, was accumulating quite a bundle of winnings. With one race left to go we asked about her methodology. Very matter-of-factly she said, “I pick the jockey whose colors I like.” With renewed hope, we abandoned her husband’s guidance and followed her lead. The horse we bet on was last past the post - my son-in-law’s horse, a sixty to one outsider, won by several lengths!

In the US, the holy grail of horseracing is the Triple Crown, an unofficial championship conferred on a 3-year-old thoroughbred horse that wins the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes, and the Belmont Stakes in a single season. First won in 1919 by Sir Barton, it has since been won only 10 times, most recently by Affirmed in 1978. One of the reasons for the paucity of winners is the very short time of 7 weeks that separates the three events, allowing little opportunity for a three-year-old horse to recuperate.

The $5 million bonus that a Triple Crown winner now is awarded can often be insignificant compared to the stud fees they earn in retirement. War Admiral, a winner in 1937, retired with career earnings of $273,240; not a bad piece of change back then, and subsequently went on to sire 40 stakes winners. Somehow I don’t think old Paul Revere will offer much competition in that category, but in horseracing, you never know.

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