Race Track Diary, Entry Number Four Century Mile (March 20, 2025)
Introduction
This blog and some following blogs are sections from an informal diary of “visits to the race-track” at a particular time and place, by a person who has followed the races with varying levels of participation over a long period. These relate primarily to some visits to the track and/or off-track betting venues in the 2025 period and onward. They contain observations about the activity, both specific and general. Although these remarks are personal, they also reflect general cultural and historical trends, as they have impacted horse-racing, wagering and culture in general.
The setting is Edmonton, Alberta, Canada (population of about one million plus). However, I imagine that the observations would apply to many places in the world, as they are a reflection of how changing trends in technology, globalization and culture in general have affected this ancient and honorable activity of horse-racing.
For now, I will use what I call “polished point-form” for the narrative.
4 – Century Mile 2 (March 20, 2025)
It was a second trip to Century Mile, near the airport, also known as the actual racetrack (as opposed to an Off-Track Betting site). On this trip, we took some back-roads into the airport area, rather than the main highway, courtesy of Google Maps.
This was a pretty good route, missing heavy traffic on Highway 2. It was a fairly direct run, but there were a few spots that were unpaved, with washboard ruts. Craig didn’t like that, so he took the main highway back from the track.
Scott (my son) accompanied Craig and myself, since he had a week of vacation time from work and thought it would be something new and interesting to do. He had come with me to the track on occasion, back when he was in elementary school, but had not been back since then. Now that he is grown up, it is time to take up the family tradition (his grand-dad was also a bit of a horse-player, way back in the day).
It was a rather pleasant late winter (or early spring) afternoon. The place was reasonably busy, based on the car count, especially by the time we left. There was a power-ball draw upcoming, whatever that may be. It seems to attract a lot of regular citizens, who prefer slots and VLTs to horses.
Having said that, the off-track betting section of the casino was fairly empty. We also had a quick look at the outdoor track. There were many vehicles in that section of the parking lot (not open to the public, so evidently for the horse owner/trainer/rider crowd). It looked as if they were preparing for the upcoming bucket-puller (harness races) meet.
I look forward to visiting later in the year, when the thoroughbred meet is in action. Race horses are such fine-looking noble animals (regular horses are too, but race-horses take that up a notch). I always enjoyed looking them over at the paddock parade, though it would be a lie to say that I am any judge of horse-flesh. But on at least one occasion I picked a high-odds winner, just on the basis that it looked regal and ready to go. One of my other brothers, who was at the track with me that day, would later frequently remark on that. Another advantage of the paddock is the rather attractive young women who would walk the horses around. On that score I won’t lie – that holds some appeal as well.
We opened the betting with Craig scoring a big win of a Superfecta on the first race. That’s where you pick the first four horses in a race. He picked up about 175 dollars on that. His handicapping is basically odds-based. He tries to figure out which combinations of horses will come in from an examination of the odds, factoring in supposed cheating by the horse owners/trainers/jockeys/track. I never know how much he believes this to be true. It’s a bit cynical, but...whatever. Sometimes it works.
For my time, I tend to go on records for speed, times, and final positions of horses. For these trips, I just do it by hand, rather than rigorous math/stats, which I used to do, in an earlier incarnation. I played around with a pdf containing past performances of harness horses (programs are free on-line), but the format is rather tricky (e.g. superscript fractions rather than decimals). So, coming up with an efficient way to parse the data for a stats package or spreadsheet might be a rather difficult and time-consuming task. It is tempting, but not sure if I want to make a big time commitment like that, over a once-a-week hobby.
Going for exactors, consisting of a likely favorite and a longer odds horse that has some good indications (e.g. time, final position, etc.) has worked pretty well. Last time out, I made some decent money, and on this day I broke even. Scott and I nearly picked up a good price on the final race, but missed by one unexpected horse getting in the top 3. So it goes.
Scott was also betting a few bucks that his mom (my wife) gave him to bet, just for laughs. For those bets, he used the “interesting horse name” method. Basically, that’s when the horse’s name gives off a good vibe, has some sort of personal meaning to the bettor, rings a bell, things like that. It’s magical thinking, but whatever. Sometimes it works. It’s very appropriate when betting for his mom, as she is very into all that stuff.
For the thoroughbreds, we chose to bet on a track called Turf Paradise, which is located in or around Phoenix Arizona. Though Phoenix is a pretty big place, I sense that its track is not considered to be top tier. Plus, as I understand it, Arizona tracks have a pretty high takeout (that’s the cut of the money that the track and government take, which reduces the prices that bettors get). Santa Anita (near L.A.) wasn’t running on this day, which is a track I prefer. It is considered to be fairly top tier, with a more reasonable take-out.
For what it is worth, I did better betting on Santa Anita than on Turf Paradise. Of course this is far too small a sample to draw any conclusions from. That said, there is a school of thought that the bigger tracks are more honest or at least more reliable, from a handicapping perspective. That’s because there is more money at stake, therefore more eyes on the prize, looking out for skulduggery.
An alternative view is that small tracks are better. The betting pools are smaller, so nefarious betting coupes are easier to spot. That’s when a trainer darkens a horse’s form, so that it will go off at higher odds than it actually rates, and the trainer or owner can score a big payday that way.
On the other hand, there is a school of thought that jockeys (or sulky drivers) can more effectively join in conspiracies, to let a long-odds horse win, thus picking up some nice betting prices for the inside group.
This kind of reasoning is endless, it is circles inside circles. But it is kind of fun. When a 99 to 1 horse comes in first, it gets knowing nods and looks from betters. It can seem like a more likely explanation than “on any given day, any horse can beat any other horse" (or a whole field of any others).
Speaking of conspiracy theories, when I went to the washroom, a security guy was washing his hands as I left. Then, during a later trip, same thing, same guy. Coincidence? Or, was he checking on some nefarious form of cheating that goes around, that I don’t know about. Maybe he was watching me, figuring that I was working some kind of gambling coupe. Or maybe he was just watching out for smokers, catching a few puffs in the facility. I’m mostly just kidding about all that.
On that note, there is a small cigarette smoking area near the entrance to the casino. It had a sort of bus shelter enclosure, with a sign saying that smoking marijuana is not permitted there (smoking a joint is now legal in Alberta, whereas smoking tobacco is nearly illegal, or at least heavily regulated). A couple were out there having a cig – we shared a laugh with them about the changing morality over the decades.
Scott had a plate of fish and chips. I had a Caesar salad. The food was ok. We also had a Rickard’s Red each. These corporate places don’t sell good local craft beers, of which there is an ample supply in the city – I suppose the track makes deals with the big breweries.
For the last race or two, some fellows sat at the table next to us. They didn’t seem to be betting, just talking trash. They were loud but not to an overbearing extent. Craig said they were plumbers, somewhat dismissively. As an electrician, he was in what is considered the highest status trade, by most people. But the world needs functioning toilets too, so hurrah for plumbers.
After the Turf Paradise meet was done, we called it a day. Craig had made some bucket-puller bets, on Mohawk/Woodbine races (Toronto), but he said that he would watch them on the internet later.
It was a pretty good day. Craig had a nice win. I broke even. Scott seemed to enjoy it, even if he didn’t hit any winners. Maybe next time.
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Since I am running a book publishing blog, here is a plug for a horse-racing oriented short story that I wrote.
A Dark Horse
The story is just $0.99 U.S. (equivalent in other currencies) and about 8000 words. It is also available on Kindle Unlimited and is occasionally on free promotion.
U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
U.K.: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
Spain:https://www.amazon.es/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
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Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B01MDMY2BR
Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B01M9BS3Y5
Here’s an interesting review from Goodreads
(BTW, the writer has never met the reviewer and was not even aware of the review until very recently – You can look up the review on Goodreads, if you like)
A Dark Horse
Every gambler is
bound to run out of luck eventually, right?
By far my
favourite type of horror is psychological horror. I was quite pleased
with how Mr. Olausen frightened his audience without spilling a
single drop of blood or so much as hinting at anything gory. He knew
exactly what hints to drop for us that made us deliciously dread the
next scene simply by throwing out hints about who or what the dark
horse might actually represent. This is the kind of stuff I love
getting scared by, especially as Halloween approaches.
It
would have been helpful to have more character development in this
short story. While I certainly wouldn’t expect to see as much time
spent on this as I would for a full-length novel, I did have trouble
connecting to the main characters due to how little I knew about them
and how much their personalities seemed to remain the same no matter
what happened to them. If not for this issue, I would have felt
comfortable choosing a much higher rating as the plot itself was well
done.
I must admit to not knowing much about gambling at
all, so I appreciated the brief explanations the narrator shared
about how placing bets works and why some people have so much trouble
walking away from a bet. While I will leave it up to experts on these
topics to say how accurate everything was, I did enjoy learning more
about the main character’s addiction and what he hoped to gain from
betting on just one more game or race. It gave me a stronger sense of
empathy for folks in his position.
A Dark Horse – A
Gothic Tale was a deliciously chilling story for the Halloween season
and beyond.
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