About Jim the Tolerable
I grew up in Wanamaker, Indiana just one short hour away from old Latonia Race Course (now Turfway Park) in Florence, Kentucky. September of 1983 brought my first trip to the track thanks to my friend, Tony. It was on that very first trip that I cashed my very first Win ticket on a horse named Jungle Chief. A trip to Churchill Downs for the 1984 Kentucky Derby came the following May.
I visited the track(s) when I could, and served as the resident “expert” for family and friends at various times and on various trips. Reading what I could find, studying new and old Racing Forms, and catching as much racing on TV had to suffice for several years.
These days, however, we have satellite TV and the Internet. I have nearly an unlimited source of information literally at my fingertips. Racing can conceivably be watched 24 hours a day from home and, with the proper equipment, multiple tracks can be watched at once. I quickly learned that none of this has made the game any less interesting or any more simple to conquer.
Through diligence, study, discipline, experience and self-study, I can now say with confidence (and accuracy) that I am a winning horseplayer. I win at the races. It’s true. I know full well, however, that maintaining profitability over the long haul is a constant challenge and that I must never stop learning. Thanks to technology, that is much more possible today than it was visiting Latonia on Friday evenings in the 1980′s.
Through it all, I am a fan first. There are very few visions that rival the beauty of a Thoroughbred in full flight and very few sports with the history, romance and mental stimulation as horse racing. It is a romantic sport; one of great tradition and granduer.
It is, most truly, the Sport of Kings.
