If you are an avid reader of my blog, you probably know that Mari`s father, Ruy, is a big horse racing fan. His passion for the game goes so far that he writes and submits weekly race forecasts and has a weekly spot on a local radio station.
Thus, the other day, when we didnt have much else going on - we headed down to Hipodromo Las Piedras, one of the local horse racing tracks. Las Piedras isn´t the biggest or the fanciest racetrack, but it´s a bit off the beaten path and looks to have a rustic heart that gives it a bit of charm. Ruy reminisced that back when he was a kid, Las Piedras was a lot nicer and fancier, but its been hit hard over the last few decades. Plus, it now lives in the shadow of the bigger, grander, and much more prestigious Moroñas. Anyways....
We were there, enjoying the day, laying down bets and losing - but having fun the whole time. I think we stayed for 4 or 5 races. The process is interesting and goes like this. First they bring the horses out into a small pen for all to see, walking them around and letting them get some sun and air. Heres where you can take in the massiveness of the animal, see up close the musculature of the horse, and analyze the horses personality a bit - all to size the animal up in order to make a more qualified bet. Next, the jockeys come out, and you get to weigh them up a bit too, how big they are (very small), read up on their personal records, that sort of thing. Then they round up their horses and head out to the track where they line up in the gate, and race. The race doesnt take long, it´s all over in roughly a minute or two, depending on the predetermined length of the track (800m, 1000m, 1200 m). Then the whole process is repeated. Each run through takes roughly a half hour, thus there are roughly 2 races per hour.
After the 4 or 5 races, we all hopped back in the car and leaft the track, returning home and moving on with our normal lives. Originally, I wasn´t going to write about this day and put it in the blog, as there was nothing substantial and impressive to write about. Kinda a normal day, even though it was my first time visiting a horse track here and all. But still, not much to write home about. But after a small twist of events, the story finally gained enough value to become blog worthy.
About a week after our visit to Las Piedras, Ruy bought the newest Invasor - a weekly magazine dedicated to horse racing and horse racing afficianodos. Its full of data on horses, future and past races, articles of great jockeys and horses, and things of that nature.
In the back of the magazine, like in the back of many magazines, they have photos of champion horses winning great races from various tracks around Montevideo the previous week. In this example, you can see the spread has a total of 4 photos on the two pages - all taken from Las Piedras on May 6th 2011.
The photo in the upper right shows the winning horse - Cascaruda, with the jockey, owner, family and friends.
And if you look real close in the background, behind the guy in the white hat, you can see me, Matias, and Mari - unknowingly peering into the award winning photo. I am holding Matias, and Mari has the camera up to her eye taking a photo.
After seeing the photo above in the magazine, I dug into our photo Archives here at American Excursion headquarters, and found the shot Mari was taking at that exact instant. Here´s her point of view at the same time.
Not too shabby for a casual day spent at the track. I have included a few more nice pics from that day.
Watching my money go down the drain.
Hipodromo Las Piedras.
Matias contemplating his next big bet.
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