The Derby, Part I

Keith "Dogshit" Karem. I've known Keith for quite a while...jeez, ten, maybe twelve years now. I know many hardcore sports fans--myself included--but no one, absolutely no one, comes close to Keith's intensity level when it comes to sporting events, teams, betting on sports (sorry, Brett), college sports in general, high school recruiting, and cheerleaders. If I'm not mistaken, Keith at one point had a team in a dozen different fantasy SPORTS, which has to be a record of some sick, strange kind.

Anyway, I call Keith "Dogshit" because that's his signature line whenever somebody does something incredibly dumb, both on and off the athletic field. And, I've been calling Keith for years after we lived together in 2000-2001 to set up a Derby trip, because he's from Louisville, sometimes referred to as "Luaville." After much prodding and pleading, and obvious references to the fact that Keith is usually only good if you are in front of him (let's just say that the telephone and Keith are not very good friends), my man Karem finally got the stars in line and organized a big Derby trip for the 2008 running of the race.

Let's just say this: this essay is titled "Part I" because there will certainly be a sequel trip for me, next year or sometime in the near future. Many thanks to all of the people who made this trip great, which start with the Karem Krew (Peg, Greg, Keith and Michelle), for housing some of our sorry asses and providing the best egg-and-sausage soufflé this side of Albuquerque. Of course, who can forget the teammates: Gordon, Terry, Erin, Laura, Rishi, Catherine, Derek, Dustin, Beth and Lauren. I'd take any of you--well, maybe almost any of you--to war the next time I hang out on an exotic, far-away trip like this one. Maybe.

Most of the teammates, including (l. to r.) Dustin, Rishi, Keith, Catherine, Derek, Laura, Terry, Erin and Gordon

Terribly Expensive Seersucker, Hilariously Inexpensive Miller Lite

Friday night, our crew of nine people (which grew to 13 by the time we hit Derby the next day) hit a reasonably high-end spot near Keith's family's house in Louisville called the North End Cafe. Nice place, nothing incredible, and to be honest, they torched both my steak and the steak of your friend and mine, Gordon "The Professional" Stokes. But, I can't tell you how weird it is to go somewhere that charges $26 for lasagna and $3 for Miller Lite. In fact, this dichotomy carried weight throughout the weekend; drinks everywhere seem to be incredibly cheap in Louisville--even on Derby weekend--but a large cheese pizza at a nearby shop cost literally $21. I got a glass of Jefferson Reserve Very Small Batch for $12; something tells me this costs a lot more out in the world. Meanwhile, gas was $3.70 a gallon. (Yeah, no change there. It used to be that gas was cheaper in certain parts of the country...now, gas costs $3.70 everywhere. Oh, wait...now it's $3.71.)

The restaurant ended up being one of the weekend's true highlights, not just because of the cheap booze but also because someone decided to have a 25-person family reunion at the table across from ours, which turned our otherwise-normal meal into what essentially became dinner theater. That's right, this family of 25--a mix of young, old, rich and...well, rich--began to stand up and break into a local rendition of "Day-O (Daylight Comes...)" while locking arms and celebrating the piles of money they all have or some such non-sense...and, that was at 9:30 PM. Over the course of the night, one of the family members, an older British gent, was reciting lines from Shakespeare while acting out soliloquies on a nearby stoop; others were asking for requests for popular pop songs; that same Brit came over and did a bit of swing dancing with one of our ladies; someone actually called me Fatboy Slim (not realizing that the real-life British dance DJ is a tall thin white guy, not a tall, somewhat oversized black guy). For kicks, I broke out with a bad rendition of the theme song from that old TV show "The Real American Hero" and we sat around wondering what it must be like to wear expensive seersucker suits to a dinner party and throw down a couple grand on dinner, just because we've got the dough.

Kentucky in general--this was my first trip through the lovely state--just seems to have a higher Character Per Person ratio than some other places I've been. By this, I mean that you just seem more likely to meet a guy who isn't cookie cutter in Louisville; I met a lot of people that in a brief amount of time made a major impression on me, positive and negative, saying things that will stick in my memory and having a love for life that I don't often see. I often lament how stale and uniform the people of DC can be, but maybe Louisville is this way too and I just don't know it yet. My gut tells me, though, that Kentucky is full of characters like the ones at the restaurant Friday night, and I like that a lot.

And, the rest of the crew: Beth, Michelle and Lauren

Louisville Nightlife--Don't Worry, South Beach, You Ain't Missing a Thing

I was talking to Lauren, one of Michelle's friends from college, late Saturday night as we sat at a "club" within Fourth Street Live, an indoor/outdoor collection of bars and lounges that are self-contained in a building in downtown Louisville. We were chatting about the shitastic DJ purportedly playing "hip-hop" at this establishment--which had a vaguely Spanish name, even though it clearly catered to white frat boys--and realized that it was only shitastic if you knew better, which Lauren (lives in NYC) and I (DC) do. For the folks in Louisville, though, it seemed like the people were all fired up about this DJ, who was playing such crap music that I couldn't even sorta pretend to be dancing to it.

And, it kind of hit me that you can't judge places like Louisville in quite the same way; in fact, after I bought another $3 Miller Lite (still can't believe these drinks were these prices in a bar in a major city), I just sat back and did what I had been doing most of the weekend--watch the people of Louisville do what they do best, which seems to be walking around looking at other people.

My experience was limited, but it appeared that within the downtown areas, you're really only going to get bars and some more bars. I'm sure that on both Friday and Saturday night, places were a bit more crowded than normal due to Derby people traffic, but the spots themselves were nothing special. I already plan to rent out a community room at a high-end hotel on the next trip and bring my iPod and my dance shoes, because that might be more fun with a big group of people.

The Derby--The Spectacle of the Infield

The infield, featuring a mid-afternoon mud wrestling match

The window said "$40--INFIELD TICKETS--CASH ONLY." The window should have said

"$40--INFIELD TICKETS--MUST ENJOY MUD WRESTLING, TITS, FRAT PARTIES AND WILDLY UNPROFESSIONAL BEHAVIOR."

Like most infields at horse races--so I'm told, anyway--the Derby infield was a potpourri of activities mostly unrighteous: women baring their, ahem, souls for the enjoyment of others; kids from 15 years old on up getting so bombed that by 3 PM, people were randomly puking in various parts of the infield; a large circle had formed to enclose not only random soccer games but also mano-y-mano wrestling matches between men and women staged for the delight of those nearby. People dressed for the occasion--flip flops, old clothes, lewd t-shirts (I think I only saw one guy wearing a "I Fucked Your Mom, Too" t-shirt), and mud spattering, thanks to the rain that consistently fell throughout the week prior to the Derby. I knew that all of this would be the case coming in, and thanks to the second-largest crowd in Derby history--a stunning 157,000 people--the crowd delivered in spades, an incredible mix of people who simply felt that the grandstands were for the birds.

Gordon and I--the old fogies of the group--both agreed that if we had hit the Derby when we were, say, 25, the Derby is a different party. But, when you've been out in the world for a while, guys deciding to skip the bathroom to just piss ten feet from you (in your direction) aren't quite as cool, you know? Also, I'm very confident that I was eyeing up questionably-underage trim all day and that makes me feel even dirtier to boot.

It's worth noting, by the way, that contrary to what many people thought prior to my arrival at the Derby, there are a ton of black folks who hit the race. Don't be fooled into thinking that this is for Joe Whitey only...no, this puppy is for anyone that likes booze and betting on horses, and last I checked, EVERYONE likes to throw money at the ponies. It's also distinctly un-redneck, or certainly less redneck than the NASCAR races I have been too, which are straight outta trailer parks. The Derby feels a bit more upscale.

Also worth noting--I have been many places, friends, and pound for pound, I think the women at the Derby (I hesitate to say Kentucky, because it was hard for me to feel out locals) might outpace nearly everywhere I have been in terms of consistency. You might get bigger highs in Miami, LA or NYC (or, ahem, Reykjavik for that matter), but in terms of pound-for-pound consistency, I thought the people at the race were mainly looking good. REAL good, in fact.

We were in the infield from about noon until about 7:30 PM. Races at the track actually start quite early, around 8 or 9 in the morning, and there's roughly one per hour until the Derby stars at 6 PM. Even after the Derby is over, you get one or two more races, so the Derby day is a long one. Luckily, our day was a beauty--low 70s, a good breeze, lots of sunshine but never overpowering thanks to slightly overcast skies. And, most of my money was still in my pocket.

Gordon, Keith and JB walk the walk and mint the julep

The Derby--Cash on the Ponies

I have very strict personal rules around gambling, not just on horses but on games of chance in general. However, I did decide before the day started that I would bet on long shots during the Derby race, and I dropped $10 on a trifecta "box" (meaning that I picked two horses to come in first and second, but "box" lets me win no matter what order those two horses come in) that would have paid out something stupid, like $25,000. I figured, I'm at the Derby, I might as well have a story to tell if I win something, and that something ain't gonna be $20, you know? Naturally, I lost that $10...in fact, the only bet I did win on Derby day was when I won $4 from Gordon, Rishi, Laura and Beth when I picked the five-minute time window when a guy stumbling near our blanket in the infield threw up. (Damn, I knows me some puke signals!!)

However, even I could see where throwing a little money down on each race would make it fun, and I think it is this distinction that separates the Derby from other horse races...people actually do watch the horses when races begin. People clearly are into it whenever a race starts, and you can see people scoping out their bets for future races whenever a race ends. It makes for a fun day, especially because your odds of winning are much higher in the non-Derby races, as there are half the number of horses (10) as there are in the Derby (20).

No one seemed to be more into the potential of winning money (taking Keith out of the equation, because no one tops Keith in Craziness) than Erin, a woman who seemed to be reading the race prospectus like these were actual stocks, and was strangely into betting on the horses throughout the day. I had a weird flash-forward moment when I saw Erin win her first race (I think it was for something like $20, but she still was pretty fired up); I envisioned her sitting in a shitty Atlantic City casino, playing nickel slots but sitting there with that bombed-out, blank-stare look as she pulled the crank on yet another roll at a chance to salvage her social security, her marriage, her fourteen grandchildren and her complete lack of sanity.

But, that vision only lasted for a moment. There she was again, running off to the ticket window to buy another set of tickets for the next race and cash in on her win. She's probably not addicted...right?

The Derby--How the Other Half Lives

Your vision of the Derby probably smacks against what I have described so far, certainly in terms of the infield. That's because the Derby divides its kingdom into two halves.

We have the Paupers, peasants like me who drop a little cash to gain access to the building, wear shitty clothes, lay down $1 and $2 bets and hop around like giddy children when we take home a $5 payday, have little to no view of the horse track (although there are plenty of large scoreboard monitors throughout the infield), and have access to things like KFC, portapotties and tits.

Then, we have the Royalty, and this is probably what you think of when you think of the Derby. Men in lily white, powder blue or other soft-colored suits, women in stunning dresses, skirts, and other classy duds; multi-hundred-dollar hats that come in boxes more expensive than your utility bill. They valet their cars when they go to McDonald's; they drop a couple grand for a box seat for a race that literally lasts less than two minutes. They have bathrooms, they have incredible views of the tracks as well as views of the peons who couldn't afford to step it up to the big time.

In reality, it is probably more fun to be in the infield. I get that. But, I'm older now, and I have a little money...and, I think the next time I go to the Derby, I was to see how the other half lives, if anything to round out my Derby experience. I'd like to think that I'm a man of the people, so doing the infield first is the way to go (and further, I get the feeling that once I taste the sweet fruit of the grandstand, there's no going back). But, the temptation, the allure of the grandstand had me buzzing even into the next day.

71°...grandstands...sun dresses...what a sight...see you again soon

Good stuff. I'm already looking into a box for next year!!!

Random Bellviews, courtesy of Bell and Longer Community Trust:

Making your outbound flight by just 15 minutes: Opening Weekend
That $21 cheese pizza, and the Karem family outdoor furniture: $9.50 Show
Having the freedom to eye up the sights; not having your lovely fiancée to make fun of the sights with you: Matinee
Mint juleps (at the infield, anyway): Rental
Trips with a group of people this cool that only last two days: Hard Vice

bellview--whole lotta zoomin'

The Derby, Part I