Thursday, May 3, 2012
Thursday saw us leave Michigan around 4pm. Al by himself in one car, Erik, Dave and Doug
in Erik's car, and myself and Jim in my car.
We stopped for a bite at Arby's somewhere in Ohio, picked up Mert in
Cincy, and made it to Louisville around 11pm.
After checking into the hotel, this time the Comfort Suites in
Louisville on Paramount Parkway - which we got for a song at a rate of $109 per
night, they were going for $429 per night online a few days before the trip -
we made our way out for what is now the annual trip to Trixies.
After we got there (minus Al, who apparently fell asleep in
his room and missed the festivities), we immediately started on the beer, as
well as shooting pool. The vibe was
pretty dead when we got there, and the "dancers" were about the
same. A few girls were trying to get our
attention, but they were nasty, and we were more interested in our own thing
than what little they had to offer. At
this point Erik discovered the punching bag machine, where your punch strength
is measured. Here is some video of Erik
running across the bar to get a head of steam before punching it. Here is a link in case the embedded video below doesn't work.
Also here is Jim punching said machine. Here is a link in case the embedded video below doesn't work.
Our group must have put $100+ into that machine at $1 a pop
throughout the night, betting more and more money as the night went on. Finally near the end I decided to give it a
go. I figured I would be one of the
weakest ones, but once I saw Dave's piss poor effort, I figured there was no
way I could do worse. It turned out that
I had the second highest score of the night, which was much to the chagrin of
people who were betting against me. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to make much on
myself for whatever reason. Theories
were abound as to how I was able to get the 2nd highest number, with Dan's
theory being that since I am an Engineer, I was able to somehow determine the
optimum angle of attack / trajectory. My
theory is that most of the guys are bigger pussies than they think, while I am
less of a pussy than they think.
We ended up staying until 3am, which as usual makes Oaks day
difficult to handle.
Friday, May 4, 2012 - Oaks Day
We grabbed the usual parking spots at Charlie and Phil's,
had some beers for the road, and made our way to Churchill. The day started off slowly, with a few marginal hits. Sonny hit a few signers, but he was putting a
lot into the races to hit them, so while building a profit, it wasn't as big as
it would have seemed. In the 6th race, 2011 Kentucky Oaks runner
Plum Pretty looked very good on paper, but my friend Erin had a theory that she
was tired, and was vulnerable. I have no
recollection about how I profited from that race, but I am fairly sure I did,
as she ran 3rd behind Juanita and St Johns River.
Then in the 7th race I got something going with a superfecta
that I shared with the Dave and Erik. I
didn't think we had it at first, I think I wheeled on the 21-1 longshot in 1st
and 2nd, and she ran 3rd, but then I realized I did have her for 3rd on one
ticket, and the longest shot on the board ran 4th. I had also started a pick 5 ticket with both
Dave and Erik on this race, where most of the money was focused on the winner
of the 7th race, and singling on Stephanies Kitten in the 8th, who I felt was a
standout in that field. Unfortunately,
because I had opened a pick 5 already, I chose not to open any pick 4 tickets,
since the combinations were duplicated.
The 8th race went as expected with Stephanies Kitten winning by a
comfortable 2 lengths. The 9th race was
a good result, as the 3rd choice, Successful Dan won, which helps the pk5
payout as well. The 10th race was a
difficult race, and my two key horses were the 13 and 14. Because of my pick 5, I chose not to put
money into the race, and was slightly upset to see the race come in 13-10-14,
and pay $14K on the superfecta, and $1300 on the trifecta. But, we were through with the 3rd choice
again in the pick 5. There was also a
long weather delay before the 10th race, where they actually evacuated the
infield and grandstand, so part of the reason I didn't bet the race was because
of uncertainty with (A) whether the race would stay on the turf, and (B) how
the track would be playing following the rain.
The Oaks was closing out the pick 5, and we thought the race
was very wide open. We had 6 possible
horses to win, with some really good payoffs on the longshots. Our hopes were rewarded when Rosie Napravnik
brought in Believe You Can at 14-1 to win the Oaks, getting us one of our best
results, a payout of $1595 for the .50 cent pick 5. It was the first pick 5 that I had ever
hit. As I mentioned before, the pick 4
which I had neglected to play and was easy to hit based on my handicapping, as
I got it AABA, paid $750 on a .50 cent bet.
By the conclusion of Oaks Day, most people were doing well,
with Sonny up over 1K, myself up about 200.
Al was up, and Dave and Erik weren't doing badly either. The only person not doing so well was Doug,
who was the victim of losing some large win bets on prohibitive favorites.
After the Oaks, we went to the Mexican restaurant next to
the hotel. Seeing that the following day
was Cinco de Mayo, it not only seemed appropriate, it seemed prudent since the
following day would likely be very crowded.
I could barely touch my burrito due to the copious amounts of chips and
salsa I consumed prior the burrito delivery.
Sonny ordered the "Burrito gigante", which lived up to its
name. We played credit card roulette for
the bill, which Doug lost. Fortunately
for Doug, he and Jim bought insurance for each other, so they split the
bill.
After the Mexican food, a few of us went out to the
Godfather, a place we have been a time or two.
It was me, Jim, Doug, Sonny and Erin who were the troopers. Not much to add here, as we just had some
beers and shot the shit.
Saturday, May 5, 2012 - Derby day
Derby day started out well.
We got to our normal parking place, and Al actually paid for a guy to
"shuttle" us to the entrance in a golf cart. This would save from the inevitable
"chaf-age" from walking far in the heat. Unfortunately, the golf cart couldn't go all
the way to the main entrance due to the way pedestrian/vehicle traffic was
routed, so it didn't end up saving us much time or effort.
When we got to the track, I kept my betting fairly small for
the most part. Part of the problem was
that the races were difficult, part of it was that I wasn't feeling well, and
part of it was that I was showing a little bit of discipline, since my horse
betting has been pretty bad since last years Derby. So I apologize to anyone who was counting on
any of my handicapping and/or help on the days races. The sad truth is that I likely wouldn't have
been a lot of help.
It appeared to be a sound decision on my part, as nobody in
our group seemed to be doing anything very well, save for Jim, who continued to
be mysterious with his betting for the entire weekend. (He did buy picks from some online
source....I doubt they did very well).
For the weekend then I have absolutely no clue how well he did,
somewhere between winning a grand and losing 2 grand I would say (I told you he
was being mysterious).
It also didn't seem to be a very prudent idea to put much
money into races I had handicapped for 10-20 minutes, in comparison to the
Derby which I had spent 10-20 hours handicapping and thinking about. So I was essentially saving myself for the
Derby.
As expected, we had no shortage of money to put into the
Derby superfecta. Previous years we have
put in 1440, 1500ish, 2000ish, and 2400.
This year our team put together 4K to put into the race, and that was
with Sonny putting in far less than he had invested in previous years, leaving
him only 25% of our tickets. Knowing it
was a tough race, I knew we needed all of the money we could put together.
Everyone in our team agreed to key Gemologist, which
apparently turned out to be very wrong.
But we had difficulty identifying a 2nd horse to key. I liked Bodemeister a lot, but it didn't make
a lot of sense to key on 2 horses who were likely to be near the front of what
we expected to be quick early fractions.
After much debate and discussion, we settled on Union Rags, despite the
linked article where I basically shit on his chances. The reason being that even though he wasn't
likely good enough to win, he appeared to run a decent race every time, and
that race gave him a decent shot at hitting the board. Plus, he was likely to be off of the hot
pace. Here's how we shaped our tickets, and how the investors shook out.
As we tend to say in horse racing, you can't play em' all,
and I'll Have Another was one of the last horses we eliminated from the win
portion of the ticket, and I even went as far as to recommend throwing him
completely off of the ticket. My
reasoning made sense, in that from the 19 hole I expected him to be very forwardly
placed, as that was the running style he had shown in all of his previous
races. Consequently, I expected him to
be hung 4-5 wide on the first turn, while tracking a very hot pace. His jockey, being in his first Kentucky Derby
and relatively inexperienced, would not be capable of calming himself down, or
his horse, and would burn his energy out very early. Essentially I'll Have Another got the trip that I was thinking/hoping that Gemologist would get.
What happened in reality was that I'll Have Another was able
to get him into a great position entering the first turn about two spots out
from the rail, and in an area where he was almost all by himself, with no
traffic around him. This was the key to
the victory in my opinion. In almost
every Derby, the winner finds himself in a great spot on the first turn, and
encounters very little traffic the whole way.
Mike Smith on the other hand, I'm not sure what he was doing
all Derby day....first he moves WAY too soon on Amazombie, basically heading
Shackleford on the turn. Shackleford is
as game as they come, and you don't want to run neck and neck with him for over
1/4 of a mile, especially when the distance is more of a question for your
horse than his. Then in the Derby, he
immediately seizes the lead from the start on Bodemeister, which apparently was
the plan of Bob Baffert all along. This
part I have no problem with, but the part I do have a problem with is them
blaming Trinniberg for the hot pace.
Trinniberg was up close, but it didn't appear to me that he at any time
tried to get the lead from Bodemeister.
Smith just didn't harness enough of his speed to last, and consequently
ran through lightening fast fractions, and ran a HUGE race to nearly hold
on.
So as I said before, I take the blame for leaving the winner
off of our tickets, but since our key horses both missed the board, it wasn't
to be. I will take the credit for
predicting Rags poor run and bad trip in my previous write-up. It appears Julien Leparoux will lose the
mount on him, after failing to follow instructions, and even going as far as
suggesting that he heard a pop on Rags on the turn, yet still riding him to a
closing 7th place finish. What's the
deal Julien? If he was hurt, why
continue riding him? Just admit that you
gave him yet another bad ride, and that you are afraid of sticking a horse in a
tight spot Calvin Borel style.
As an aside, I read an article on the Derby the other day
that bears mentioning. The article
basically suggested that unless you have top end speed (like Bodemeister), the
outside/auxiliary gate is where you not only want to be, but NEED to be. This means posts 15-20. The likelihood of you getting a cleaner trip
far outweigh any ground you are going to lose.
This is a point that I definitely already knew, however the top end speed
thing is something I hadn't thought of but makes sense. I will not let drawing an outside post
position affect me one iota, unless they are a horse I expect on the lead.
Basically the entire group got whitewashed on the Derby, save
for Erin hitting a small win bet on the winner.
I hit a win bet in one of the last 2 races, but basically ended up down
about a grand on Derby day, with basically all of it coming on the Derby
itself.
Following the Derby, we decided to hit the Chinese
buffet. I suggested this was a bad
intestinal idea (as Dan will affirm to, since he spent 30+ minutes in the
community bathroom in the hotel). What
was another bad idea was the credit card roulette, which saw me losing and
footing the $150 bill. I have probably
lost 3 of my last 6 times at CCR, and decided that credit card will be retired
from the battle, and I proceeded to use another on at breakfast the next
morning.
After dinner, a few of us (Me, Dave, Erik, Jim, Sonny and
Doug) went back to Trixies. We managed
to get Jim and Dave a nice motorboat,
and Sonny broke our groups record at the punching bag machine. I neglected to try, as I didn't think I could
beat Sonny's mark, and also didn't want to hurt my hand anymore than it already
did (from an errant shot two nights before).
The aftermath
Overall a very fun trip, despite ending in financial
disappointment for all. Hopefully I'm
able to apply some of the lessons learned from this year's Derby into next
years Derby.
My next effort at credit card roulette, using a different credit card at the Waffle House nearby the hotel, was successful, as Erik was the victim.
Lessons learned
As I mentioned before. We've seen it countless times. The auxiliary gate is the place to be. It's not good, but the inside is "less good".
For god's sake, when there is a horse with standout speed figures, ala Bodemeister, make that horse one of your key horses.
Just because you have Pick 5 tickets live, doesn't mean you can't play Pick 4, especially when you have a few strong opinions upcoming. That decision likely cost me at least $750.
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