Growing up, I visited a horse track or saw a single horse race.
That all changed once I met Kate and married into a horse race-loving family. Rick Surwilo, my father-in-law, had started visiting the racetrack as a teenager with his loved ones. This is a time prior to lotteries and casinoshorse racing was the only legal form of gambling, so it was something really different to really go and do. His family lived in Connecticut but had bought a tiny home in Woodford, Vermont, also Rick’s daddy loved to take the wife and children to the Green Mountain Race Track in Pownal, only a little ways south of there. They had set up their lawn chairs by the finish line, and Grandpa Surwilo would take everybody’s orders and move relay the stakes to the tellers.
When I started dating Kate, one of those earliest, and many amorous, dates was once she took me to the racetrack here in Tulsa. We had a great time gambling on a couple of horse races while snuggling in the bleachers as a thunderstorm rolled in.
After Kate and I got hitched, her parents could take us to the horse races each other summer or so, and even gave us bad newlyweds a tiny scratch to bet with. Rick’s dad had long since passed away, but Gram Surwilo–each inch that the stereotypical feisty Italian grandma–loved to go and bet on the ponies, just as she had in the old days in Vermont.
I truly enjoyed these outings with my extended family, and placing a few bets myself, but I admittedly had no idea what I was doing. I mostly just picked the horses together with the titles I liked best.
So I jumped at the opportunity America’s Best Running offered me a month or two back to come see one of the six pre-Kentucky Derby races–the Spiral Stakes–in Turfway Park in Florence, Kentucky, and get some lessons about the best way best to bet on the ponies. Kate and I had a terrific time and learned a ton. Betting on horses is a good deal more complex than I had imagined, but it’s really a fantastic deal of fun.
Today, I will share some of the basics of what I heard, so the horse racing neophyte can make the most of the wonderful spring weather and return to their regional racetrack (or the Kentucky Derby! ) ) Feeling like they know what they’re doing.
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