The guy on my left at the $2/3 game was reading the Daily Racing Form.
If you're not on Social Security, this might mean nothing to you. But the DRF is the bible for horse racing bettors and has been for over 100 years.
It comes out every day, and handicappers pore over it looking for an edge. Most bettors probably use the online version now, but it’s clearly still in print—the #3 seat was studying it carefully.
I would bet a lot of money that the average age of the DRF print reader is at least 75 – my tablemate pushed that number up.
Once an orbit or two, he'd put DRF down and participate in a poker pot, but it was clearly an interruption of his primary task, which was figuring out which ponies he was going to bet.
When he did bother to put chips into a pot, he always came in for the minimum. I raised an eyebrow when he cold-called a preflop raise, but he promptly folded the flop and went back to his paper.
The whole time, he would occasionally mumble a sentence or two. I wasn't sure if it was intended for me, somebody else, or if he was just amazed that Frisky's Dream could be 7/2 at Aqueduct.
And then, finally, he plays a hand
A couple of hours later, lightning struck the table. Racing Form open-raised to $20 over a $6 straddle. I had already folded and was waiting for the formality of everybody else folding so we could get onto the next hand.
Except the #5 seat hadn't been paying attention and called. Now I sat up in my chair, 'cause I wasn't going to miss this.
The flop came J-T-8, and Racing Form shoved for his remaining $70 (he didn't seem like the type to play deep). #5 called pretty quickly. The dealer ran out the board, and Racing Form flipped over pocket kings (we caught him at the bottom of his range). #5 mucked.
As Racing Form was pulling in the chips, he mumbled again. In that moment, I wouldn't have traded my seat for anything, because I caught his mumble clear as day:
"What'd you think I had?"
