So you want to be a horse player?

Well, be prepared to do the work because this is not an easy business. Many people are trying to convince you that it is, but don’t be fooled, you have to learn to handicap and you have to be prepared to make decisions and base your decisions on solid handicapping principles. I’m afraid the onus is on you to learn and that no handicapping software or handicapping game or pick sheet will do the work for you. 

A day at the races without handicapping the card, without your own opinion—based on the study of the facts laid out in the past performances–-is just another pleasant day outdoors inhaling the pungent odor of horse manure. To fall in love with this game and want to be a handicapper you must experience the thrill of having a horse you selected about to overtake the leader of the race as they approach the finish line. Watch the jockey get low on the horse, grab a handful of horse mane and urge his mount forward; observe the horse straining to get his nose in front of his competitor just as they jump for the wire. When he crosses the finish line and your number goes up on the tote board, you’re hooked…or you’re brain dead.

You have access to more information than ever before, so make use of it, and don’t depend on those who are handicappers to give you a lot of help. A unique aspect of horse racing is pari-mutuel gambling which means you are gambling against each other. You are playing against the crowd. If another handicapper gives you all his secrets you may become a better player than he and that will take away from his livelihood. That may be misguided, but it’s a fact.

I’ll give you a great example: a couple of years ago I attended a handicapping seminar in Las Vegas and they had all the major “name” handicappers from around the country scheduled to speak on their area of expertise. There where about four-hundred of us who came to the desert to be enlightened, to learn at the knee of these great giants of our game…most of the assembled speakers where not willing to divulge certain information—the information we all came to acquire—fearing that it would increase competition. The feeling being that the less the public knows the better it is for the handicapper who does know. True story. 

Horse players are opinionated to a fault. Everyone of them believes they have found the winner of any race being run whether they have taken the time to handicap the race or not. They will share with you who they think will win but will not tell you how they arrived at that enlightened opinion. Racing people are funny folks.

Handicappers are proud of the knowledge they have attained over years of playing the races. You see, this is not a skill that you acquire in a few hours or when you have finally learned to read the Daily Racing Form. When you do learn to read the Daily Racing Form then you can begin to learn, and learn you must, because this game requires a lot of work. Be prepared to spend hours handicapping a race card and know that the work must be done the night before or the morning of the races. The race track is no place to do your handicapping. You have too much to do at the track; look at the horses for positive or negative signs, watch the pre-race warm-up, keep tabs on the tote board and be sure you don’t get shut out at the window.

Horse racing is unique among sports in that the horse player is totally interactive with the event. It’s the horse player who is the challenger. Horse players are cerebral; most are very good at mathematics; and all are problem solvers. They know how to analyze a wide variety of information and make decisions based on that analysis. A day at the races is a series of challenges in the solution of problems, and horse players have a scorecard that tells them how good they are—their wallets.

How do you become a horse player? Well, first you need to be a fan. If you do not enjoy the game you will never be a horse player. You must have a sincere desire to learn more about this complicated sport. The entire world of horse racing is actively seeking the “new fan” and trying to woo them from whatever they do for sport or recreation.

In most cases the efforts are misguided because the horse racing establishment has no idea how to attract new fans. (More on that subject another day). You either get “hooked” on the game or you don’t. Period. A good example is my own situation. I learned the game from my father and I fell in love with racing at an early age. I have one brother who grew up in the same house and he never goes to the track. My own son has been to the track countless times but has never caught the fever. You either get it or you don’t.

In an effort to attract new fans a lot of people and companies are trying to reduce this game to a NUMBER. A single number that will denote the winner of every race. No way! It can’t be done. Software developers are tweaking their algorithms to find the combination that will deliver a no-brainer selection. Software is very sophisticated and very good but it can not replace the work you must do to pick a winner. Software, when used in conjunction with your own handicapping methods can be very helpful. 

We see racing “games” popping up all over the place. These people are trying to appeal to what they presume to be the NEW horse player. The FOX Generation. Zero attention span and no desire to attempt to unlock the mystery of picking a winner on their own. In some way they may be right because I believe they are looking at the fabulous success of slot machines across the country and believe that the new generation of player just wants to pull a handle and collect the money. The explosion of gambling in the United States is not so much gambling as it is slot machines. Visit one of the casino’s that are springing up like so many Jiffy Lube’s and you see that they are predominately slot machine warehouses. It is all designed to attract those who are seeking instant gratification. Horse players do not seek instant gratification.

Many pundits believe the new fan will never invest the time it takes to properly handicap a horse race. They will never open a Daily Racing Form. They just want the equivalent of the State Lottery; pick the numbers and hope you get lucky. They don’t give the new fan enough credit. Yes, we’re busy and we work longer hours (what ever happened to all the leisure time we where supposed to have with all the technological advances we now enjoy?) and we have soccer games and dance recitals with the kids, but we still find time to play golf, go to a baseball game or sit in a movie theatre for three hours because we enjoy those activities.

So it must be with horse racing. We must produce a product that the public will see as enjoyable, challenging and exciting. Horse racing is all this, but we can’t get that across to potential new fans. Maybe we’re going about this the wrong way, lets show people what it really takes to play the horses and stop trying to make them believe that you can win money and have a lot of fun by selecting a number from a software program or a computer animated game or a picks sheet and be a horse player. 

If you are a potential new fan and you’re looking for the magic number, my advice to you is prepare to do the work if you want to be a horse player. Get out to your local track and wander around and see what’s going on at the place. Look at and marvel at those magnificent animals and watch them do what they were put on this earth to do—run.  Watch a jockey, all one-hundred pounds of him, get on the back of that 1,000 pound beast and guide him around a race track at speeds in excess of forty miles per hour, held to the horse by his ability to balance on the balls of his feet, and followed around the track by an ambulance just in case he loses his balance, and tell me that’s not exciting.

If this proximity to the game of horse racing does not, over time, hook you, then move on and give golf a try and settle for the weekly office pool for your gambling thrills. 

Nobody said this was an easy game.