How To Handicap A Horse Named Obama

SANTA ANITA RACETRACK - Arcadia, CA - June 3, 2009 - The track is quiet right now because the thoroughbred racing season is over. My family has lived near Santa Anita since the early 1900's. It's an Early California style racing facility, painted in Early California Green and embellished with yellow picket trim.

It's also the main racing attraction in Southern California. My father would take me there to escape my mother's constant nagging when I was small. He had been in Southern California long enough to know all the jockeys, so it was common for Eddie Shoemaker to wave and smile, and a lot of the old timers around the track would yell out "Hey Eddie!" They called him "The Shoe."

Any horse that had the Shoe for a jockey, had a better chance of winning. My dad was not a risk-taker at the track. He would bet the 1,2,3 for $6.00, and if the horse came in 1,2, or 3, he would get enough money for a beer.

The kids that hang around with their parents at racetracks, and casinos, have a different concept of society. We don't concern ourselves with petty things, like who is going to be the next President. It's always a horse race no matter who is running.

Andrew Beyer, the mathematician, wrote the handicapper's bible. It's about 60 pages of mathematics and probability that is sure to give the reader a migraine, especially when it's combined with the ink from the racing form.

In order to handicap the horse races, you have to get the racing form a day ahead of time, then sit up all night adding up the last three racing times and then taking an average -- then you compare the average with the class of the race. This is stuff only a real track junkie would love.

Then you rush down to the race track before the crowd, and you listen to the professional handicappers, and you compare what you have with what they have. Then you mark up your program and stand around the paddock watching them lead the horses in and out all day, drinking coffee and eating donuts.

Donuts taste better at the race track than anywhere else. They have a certain stale quality that you can only get when you're around a lot of alcoholics and chain smokers.

I haven't been going to racing season for a few years, I burned out on it. I also feel sorry for the horses who are given lasix to prevent the bleeding, and I feel like I'm supporting an industry one level up from cock-fighting. I don't know if the horses like it or not. They say the horses love it, but not one horse so far has ever told me he likes racing.

As far as predicting the races, if I get two races out of nine, that's a good average.

There's an old racing joke, goes like this: This woman goes to the races for the first time, and doesn't know how to pick the winners. So she's standing there, and when the horses pass by the crowd, one of them looks right at her and winks.

She gets all excited, runs down and gets $5.00 to win on the horse. Horse comes in last. When he comes into the paddock area, the woman is waiting for him, looks him right in the eye, and horse goes "hey, what, who knew?"

I feel like Obama is doing the same thing. I'm not sure what sort of quotient we're working with here, but this horse of ours doesn't run a fast track and he's not headed for any derbys.