Anatomy of a Winner

Yesterday was gorgeous, and the Lovely Carla and I agreed to rent a car to drive out to the Arlington Racetrack to play the ponies. We conjured up a little symphony of pure-luck, guile, intuition, educated guesses, and a random hunch or two. We listened to each other, which somehow, opened us to new combinations which, somehow, (improbably) matched up with the reality. The result: we walked out with a combined $250 in winnings. Not bad. In fact, it was one of the most successful betting days I can remember.

First off, I explained to the Lovely Carla the beauty of the one-dollar, three-horse, Exacta Box (Andy Beyer's favorite gimmick bet). The Lovely C. played this little gimmick like a Master (Chairman Mao: "give a man a fish, he eats for a day, teach a man to fish, he eats for life"). She tossed some strange ponies into her gimmicks, but she anchored them with one of her favorite jockeys, Earlie Fires. It turns out Earlie had a great day (two winners and a place) and the Lovely C. parlayed this into some boxcar payoffs.

My contribution included three horses. The first one's name escapes me (he was a first time Lasix - to bet a first time Lasix pony is one of the unwritten rules - first starter), Tejano Who (I liked his breeding), and Number Juan (He used to race on the West Coast in some big races, and he'd been off since November 2004). These winners were all in cheap races - claimers, and first starters; losing horses looking for a win. I backed up my hunches ("this horse has found his spot!") with some serious cash ($20 to win here, $10 to place there). I also did some Exacta Boxes taking the Lovely C.'s advice about Earlie Fires, and figuring there was a little racing magic in the air.

So we ended up with a four-race winning streak. The Exacta payoffs added up ($45, $40, etc.). We finally hit the wall on the Big Race. I went with a horse named Southern Africa (he raced in the Belmont), but the spell had been broken, and we high-tailed it out of there with our stack of cash. "Money won is twice as sweet as money earned." Yes, I guess it's true. We went to one of our favorite Indian restuarants to celebrate our great day. We were both ravenously hungry. Dinner was on the ponies. We ate and laughed and marvelled in wonder at our run of good luck. "Who woulda thunk it?!"