The Age of Permanence

The second Fourstardave has now passed away—the human one that the famous Sultan of Saratoga was named after.

I know this because I was friends with Dave Piermont for over 50 years, from his college days to his most recent when horse racing didn't dominate his life, but FanDuel and Draft Kings did. Micro wagering that at times yielded fantastic multiples for the 25¢ or 50¢ bet. He never hit a top prize, but certainly enough to make the effort worthwhile. Failing eyesight made reading a past performance nearly impossible.

I always joke that I begin to think I might need a boost in my reading prescription when the past performance seems a bit difficult to bring into focus. There's no better guide to what your vision is than reading a past performance. You don't need that chart in an eye doctor's office. Self diagnosis.

At college at Kentucky Weslyean in Owensboro Dave furthered his growing interest in horse racing by going to Miles and Ellis Park, along with Kenneland, and I think a few trips to Churchill. Never the Derby however.

Keeneland in those days had no announcer. They just ran the races and you were on your on watching them and figuring out what you were seeing.

I always found it ironic that he took to horse racing, because his first trip to a track was with his brother, myself, and their barber James Kelly to Belmont Park on Belmont Day, 1968. Dave's brother Dennis and I had to vigorously roust him out of bed. He didn't want to go. His mother even got involved and convinced him to go. From there it became his vocation.

I don't remember if he won any money that first day—I hit the Daily Double (the only "exotic" bet in those days) cold for $22—and was sold for life on handicapping. But racing didn't become my way of life like it did for Dave. 

After a few jobs that went nowhere—even working for the company I worked for, United Medical Service (Blue Shield) as a claims examiner—Dave hit his stride by getting a job with Racing Star Weekly, a horse racing newsletter, phone service and magazine—American Turf Monthly—published by the Bomze family, Richie and Eddie.

Richie and Eddie were sons of "Old Man" Henry Bomze, someone who was making money from horse racing back in the days of he telegraph, the so-called "wire" days Indeed, the past performance publication from Walter Annenberg's Triangle Publications was named The Morning Telegraph. Another publication of Annenberg's was TV Guide. America. Horse racing and television. Apple pie as well.

If there is a heaven on earth it's working at something that doesn't seem like work at all. I remember Dave telling me about his interview with Richie. "Do you know anything about the bush league tracks?" "I sure do." The match made in heaven was sealed.

Dave picked horses to watch for tracks all over the country. He worked with his mentor Howard Rowe, a racing journalist. Tom Ainslie contributed writing to the publications, a racing writer who wrote a near best-seller on handicapping, "Ainslie's Complete Guide to Thoroughbred Racing" and who was really the Richard Carter who wrote a biography of Jonas Salk, and who also won the 1951 George Polk Award for a series on organized crime's influence on the waterfront. Ainslie's guide became my Bible in 1968.

Dave was learning handicapping from the best. Howie Rowe emphasized knowing about trainers, and following their success and failures. Their win percentages. Dave was in charge of compiling trainer stats in the days before trainer stats became the feature they are now in past performances. And doing it before computer spreadsheet software.

Dave also absorbed a New Yorker's extreme prejudice against anything upstate. Specifically Saratoga.

Howie Rowe filled Dave's head with the tales of how all the prices went up in Saratoga when the racing season began in August. Prices were taped over on the breakfast menus and higher prices were called for. Hotel rooms went for more money, etc. The whole place was described as a tourist trap. 

I don't know if Howie Rowe ever went to Saratoga, went and then stopped going, but I know Dave wouldn't set foot in the place, even after myself and another buddy started going annually (and still do). He couldn't, wouldn't buy into the bucolic beauty of the place and see it as a vacation destination. It always drove me crazy.

Being a handicapper also means being a bettor. And there are all sorts of bettors. Dave had conquered half the equation. He was a great handicapper. He stunk at holding onto the money won.

I used to sit next to him at Wantagh OTB and watch him go up and collect seemingly whenever a race was official at any of the many tracks being shown on the TVs. He'd be watching the board and circling horses' names in the past performance booklet for any of three or four tracks. I always stuck to the NYRA track of the day. Local was enough  of a challenge for me.

Hit a $1 exacta for $70 at the Finger Lakes, then plow $40 into triples at Gulfstream. Oops, nothing. The only way Dave could go home with any significant jack was to hit he last races of his betting day and run out of betting opportunities to plow any money back through the window. Simulcasting was great. And was bad.

When the racing day was over and he came over for dinner my wife always asked how we did. Sometimes I got to tell her Dave made a few hundred. "How'd you do?" I didn't win a few hundred. I lost maybe $30." "I won $20." 

I was always naturally asked why didn't I just bet what Dave bet? "You are kidding, right." Only someone who doesn't bet would ask that. It would be impossible to mimic his bets when between the chair and the window his mind was still making selections. Twirling numbers and amounts around in his head like wash in a dryer.

Dave's boss Richie was of course equally smitten with betting on the races. Dave told me Richie told him that he kept a diary of every bet he made and the result. Richie was in the $200-$203 zone per race.

He had the means to pursue his interests, and eventually became a New York Breeder and owner of New York Breds. Eventually he was head of the association.

He had a sire Compliance who he bred to Broadway Joan, a mare he also owned as well. Compliance turned out to be a great turf sire. His best progeny was Fourstardave who was the first New York Bred to win over $1 million and who had a record over 100 starts of 21-18-16. He was a gelding and is buried at Clare Court at Saratoga. By the end of his career he had won $1.6 million, putting him up there in rare air.

Richie liked to name his horses after someone in the office. Fourstardave got his name because Richie

teased Dave that he wouldn't give out a four-star pick in the newsletter as the best bet. Richie always had the office gang at he track and there is a photo of Dave with the others after one of Dave's many victories.

The "Sultan of Saratoga" nickname evolved because Dave won at least one race a season at Saratoga for eight consecutive seasons, 1987-1994. He was a fan favorite. There were T-shirts and even a bobble horse giveaway. He was a star.

Richie's trainer Leo O'Brien had a meal ticket with Richie's horses. They once won the Yaddo with a horse named Junior Pitchunia at long odds that Richie had bred from Compliance, out of the mare he owned, Pitchoune. Richie cleaned up at the window as well as getting the purse. Those were fun times.

When the New York Racing Association remodeled the decrepit space called the Carousel under its grandstand and turned it into a sports bar with nice seating, food service and TVs at every angle, they ran a contest with the public for the name they would give it. When the votes were counted FOURSTARDAVE won convincingly.

For the past several years I have reserved seats in the clubhouse for a day, then the rest of the stay is reserved to be in the FOURSTARDAVE. The outside seats are narrow, uncomfortable and you're prone to being stuck in the middle of an aisle hemmed in by the upstaters who love to picnic at the track by dragging coolers to their seats. Going in and out of the aisle is a chore, stepping over their beverages and sandwiches.

And every year at Saratoga, except last year's Covid year, I would always shake my head that Dave would never come to Saratoga. Now he can't, for sure.

Turning 70 has presented health issues, to myself, and to Dave.  His overtook him before he could even turn 72. The unseen giant has removed all the days from a few people we know. A death is the age of permanence.

Usually when a racetracker like Dave passes away someone names a race after them. Not a permanently named race on the meet's calendar, but usually an allowance race on a given day named in honor of someone . These races are arranged by the track's hospitality department and generally involve a party of x number of patrons who have secured reservations in the dining room. Track management then accedes to naming a race after the honoree. The principals in the group get to have their picture taken in the winners' circle, or even present a minor trophy to the winning connections. It's all P.R.

A friend of mine knew the family of Harry Lazarus, a die-hard NYRA bettor. When he passed away there were T-shits handed out to the group party. My friend got me one. A few years after the inaugural race for Harry the Horse we were at the rack and I noticed a mid-card race named after Harry. It was perhaps the 8th iteration of the race. Obviously, the group was keeping up the tradition and getting a race named after Harry around his birthday. Nice to be remembered.

I probably talked to Dave nearly every day since he moved back into the area in 1996. Always about the events of the day and usually about race results. The phone would always ring immediately after a Derby or a major televised race.

This past Saturday I looked over at the phone that didn't ring when the prices went up for the exacta on the Southwest Stakes race at Oaklawn when the .90 favorite Essential Quality remained undefeated and stamped himself as the early favorite for the Derby. The second favorite, Jackie's Warrior, finished third, and is not likely to take on two-turn races in the future. 

But the second place horse, a Bob Baffert trainee, Spielberg finished second at 7-1. Spielberg was the third choice and certainly had to be considered in any exotics, and exactas. And what an exacta. Essential Quality paid $3.80 to win and Spielberg paid $5.00 to place.

A rough rule of thumb is that an exacta will be the product of the win and place price of the second place horse. Thus, a reasonable expectancy might be a $15 or so exacta for $2.

What came about because of the heavy action on Jackie's Warrior was an outlier price that yielded a $31.40 exacta for $2.  A windfall. We would have loved to talk about that. I miss that.

Dave is not going to command a circle of friends so large that hospitality will name a race after him. But there is absolutely no need. Even though ironically he never set foot inside Saratoga, there is already the Grade 1 turf race run at Saratoga every year named after Fourstardave—the horse of course.

But I knew the fellow the horse was named after.

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