A Fan’s Delight : Some Come to the Race Track to Lounge and Others to Scrounge on Breeders’ Cup Day Marked by Ebullient and Euphoric Moods

It is 10 a.m. on a bright Saturday at Santa Anita.

A mariachi band is playing in front of the grandstand entrance. A queue is already forming for lunch (invitation only) at the British Pavilion, housed in a white tent on the lawn next to the grandstand entrance.

The infield tables shaded by the yellow and orange umbrellas are full. Children play on the slides and swings. The smog has cleared, providing a stunning view of the San Gabriel Mountains.

Even California Al is impressed.

“Beautiful,” he says, surveying the vista from the grandstand mezzanine.

It is his last look.

The parimutuel windows are open, and Al is a man who keeps his nose to the ground.

He is a professional stooper. Been stooping, Al says, since he was a kid. Now 52, Al may be the best there is. So good that he doesn’t want his last name used because it might interest the IRS. So good that he doesn’t really have to stoop. He merely uses his feet to flip parimutuel tickets that have been dropped to the floor, checking to see if a good one has been lost or carelessly discarded in the mistaken belief it is a loser.

Al’s goal is $100 a day, $30,000 a year. He will work only the grandstand mezzanine on Breeders’ Cup day. He is not really excited about the prospect of a big crowd. The tourists, he says, take their tickets home as souvenirs. The women, of which there are always more on a day like this, are too careful, too tight fisted.

“Give me a small day when people are more relaxed,” he says. “On a big day they’re more cautious, even the pros, the regular bettors. They’re the ones who make the most mistakes.

“I may score more (a score is finding a good ticket) today, but I probably won’t make as big a score.”

A big day also brings out another element. They’re known as bag people. Al calls ‘em scum bags. They give Al’s craft a bad name by merely scooping up handfuls of the discarded tickets at day’s end and throwing them in their Heftys to be perused later. Attrition, he suggests, has taken a toll on artisans like himself.

“You could watch a pro walk around,” Al says, “and the only time he goes down is when a ticket is good. These people come in and take everything that’s not nailed down. The game’s gone now, but there could be 17 of those people on my floor and I’d still make my daily bread.”

In the turf club, you get a choice of bread. Big bread. It seems a long way from where Al stoops, but it’s part of the same environment, just a different society. The Breeders’ Cup. A day to see and be seen.

Liza, Dinah, Merv, Mickey and Burt are among the stars in attendance. The Fords--Gerald and Betty--are guests in the directors room. The Iaccocas, familiar with horsepower of another kind, share a Turf Club table, rubbing wallets with senators, governors and sheiks. The sport of kings is now more the property of Arabian knights.

The mood here? Ebullient, euphoric. No tears if your neighbor’s horse finishes out of the money in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint. Make a million, lose a million.

Richard Duchossois, for example, acting on the recommendation of trainer Charlie Whittingham, recently joined Whittingham and Mary Bradley in purchasing the three-year-old colt Thrill Show, who had raced only in France. The price was $1.5 million. Duchossois owns 80%.

Thrill Show made his U.S. debut in the $1-million Breeders Cup Mile and finished a strong sixth after starting in the 14th or outside post and being forced to take back early.

Disappointed?

“Not at all,” Duchossois says. “He came from the 14th hole and had no place to go. This was his first race here. He’ll do well, very well. I’m very happy with him.”

He was sitting at his Turf Club table, relaxed, smiling. He is owner and chairman of Arlington Park in Chicago and Duchossois Enterprises, which is a manufacturing and services industry that owns radio and TV stations and designs and manufactures railroad freight cars among other things.

He has 56 broodmares at his Hill N’Dale Farm near Barrington, Ill., and has recently raced the successful Explosive Darling and Will Dancer among others.

“The money,” he says, alluding to the seven Breeders’ Cup races and the $10 million in purses, “is important because we make money important, but the real thrill and honor comes from competing in a championship type race.

“In fact, a lot of the status and excitement stems from the festivities and parties before the races even begin. I can’t speak for anyone else, but once the gate opens, I’d be just as excited if I had a horse running in a $20,000 allowance. I’d be running on adrenaline, running to win.”

Duchossois operates his own racing spectacular at Arlington Park, the International Festival of Racing, which is capped by the Budweiser Million. He believes it ranks with the Arc de Triomphe, the Kentucky Derby and Breeders’ Cup as racing’s premier events, but he smiles and says, “I’d like to say that the Bud Million is the greatest race in the world, but I’d have to say that this is the greatest day in the racing world, bar none. This is the Super Bowl of racing.”

He is asked if Arlington Park would like to host it.

“Any track would have to be flattered having the Breeders’ Cup,” he says, “but unless the industry provides the best for everyone, I don’t think we should act selfishly. I’m saying that how can any track compete with this in November?”

Duchossois alludes to the weather, the scenery, the capability to house a crowd in excess of 68,000. He sweeps his left hand across the attractive panorama and says nothing compares.

California Al wouldn’t know. He hasn’t looked recently. He has come up with about $150 in discarded tickets through six races but is bemoaning the fact that just after the start of the Breeders’ Cup Turf race he found a $300 win ticket on Dahar, which went off at 11 to 1 and made a run before finishing fifth.

Al doesn’t bet, saying it’s a stupid game that can’t be beat. Had the race not started, he says, he would have turned the ticket in, canceling the bet, preferring the assured $300 to the chance at about $3,600, which would have been his biggest find ever.

“I found 20 $10 (daily) double tickets at Saratoga wrapped in a rubber band,” he says. “That was worth about $3,260.”

Al is wearing a short-sleeved sport shirt, slacks, sun glasses and beard. He doesn’t require the tie that is mandatory in the turf club. His work is legal but requires discretion. Some tracks, remembering a time when the money on unpaid tickets went to charity rather than the state, still look darkly on stoopers. Al says that as a youth he was not unfamiliar with jail.

“Miami was the worst,” he says. “You could have $1,000 in your pocket and be arrested for vagrancy. They had a cell right at the track. That was real punishment. You could hear the races and think about how much money you were losing.”

Al smiles. He lives in Pasadena but was raised in Methune, Mass., near Rockingham Park. He lists several different jobs that he has had in racing and says he went to stooping because of the belief it offered the best financial rewards.

“You can make your $30,000 a year,” he says, “but you’ve got to know the good tracks. Just don’t ask me. Nobody’s going to know what I know. I had to find it out for myself. I can tell you that the best tracks may be the smallest, and I can show you a dog track that’s terrific.”

On a day featuring breeding and bloodlines, California Al is talking dogs. He’ll stoop to anything.