This (Non) Sporting Life: The Kentucky Derby

It was none the less a perfectly ordinary horse, such as convergent evolution has produced in many of the places that life is to be found. 

They have always understood a great deal more than they let on. It is difficult to be sat on all day, every day, by some other creature, without forming an opinion about them.

Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency 

by Douglas Adams 

Today's post is This (Non) Sporting Life, a blog post about sports written by a guy who knows little about sports.

The sport of today's post is known as the sport of kings, horse racing. 

And specifically the king sport in the sport of kings, the Kentucky Derby. 

My wife Andrea and I happened up the 147th running of the Kentucky Derby. About an hour before the actual race.

The race itself is only two minutes so NBC had a lot of time to fill. Lots of talking and pictures of horses and lots of extremely overdressed rich men and women, 

Last year, the Derby got pushed out of it's normal slot in May and was run in September in front of a crowd of no one. 

This year it was back on in the heady spring rush of May in front of a crowd. It looked like a lot of people to me but apparently, the 15,000 tickets sold constituted only 25% to 30% of capacity at Churchill Downs.  

While a bunch of wealthy white people strut about so proud of their accomplishments and their status, I wonder that the horses think of this.

Is there any kind of awareness of what is going on? 

• Who are all these people? 
• Why is there a gaudily clad tiny person on my back?
• Where are we going?
• Why are we in a hurry to get there?
• Do these other horses have the answers I do not? 
• Isn't this where we started from? 

What, pray tell does the horse get out of all this? 

My ponderings of equine existentialism aside, the other subject of interest are the names of the horses. 

Among this year's horses included Hot Rod Charlie and Rock Your World. They've got a lot to live up to when they're put out to stud. 

My favorite horse name this year was Soup and Sandwich. I can't begin to imagine the process of how that sobriquet was attached to this particular horse. The odds going into the race did not favor Soup and Sandwich but damn I was rooting for him.  

I think he came in last.  

Here's a Kentucky Derby factoid: the entry fee is $50,000.  The prize money bottoms out at $90,000 for 5th place. Which means if your horse comes in at anything below 5th place, it's costing you money. 

You wind up with barely enough for a soup and sandwich. 

1st place gets $3 million which is a nice chunk of change and the winner this year was Medina Spirit.  

For trainer Bob Baffert, it was a record seventh win in the race.

For jockey John Velazquez, it was his fourth Derby win.

For Medina Spirit, there's a carrot to munch on, maybe an apple. 

This is Medina Spirit winning the Kentucky Derby and asking, "Hey, isn't this where we started from?"