Once upon a time, there was a very old college with a very good football team. The college was small and known mostly to Virginians and history majors, but its football team was called--for several years following the second World War--the Terror of Dixie.

That college, naturally, is William and Mary, and its football team is still reasonably good, though I don't think that we've been able to lay claim to the title of "Terror of Dixie" for quite a few years now. One thing you should know, if you ever intend to bet on college sports that don't involve a giant Midwestern school, is that if W&M is winning in the first quarter, they WILL lose the game. The Tribe's best defense is a panicked rally sometime in the second half.

I therefore take it as a good omen for future races that, in my first race of the season, my horse came in dead last.

Pimlico's Season opened today and I hightailed it to the track the minute that school let out. Opening Day is always on a weekday and so the melange of humanity is interesting to say the least. The Clubhouse dining room is full of those who do not have to have jobs, but the trackside seats and grandstand have a different set. Every little old lady in Maryland is there happily placing her two-dollar bets. There are a few Young Exec types who manage to invent a late afternoon meeting to escape the Redwood street offices, but mostly the grandstand crowd is given in vast numbers to those who don't hold a nine-to-fiver.

Construction workers generally work by the hour anyway and so they can get off early enough for the 1 PM opening race. (Unfortunately, few of them bother to shower before heading out Park Heights avenue...) City cops and firemen, and their brethren from surrounding counties, must draw lots in advance to get the day's shift off. They're all there en masse. Shortly after three o'clock, the teachers start showing up.

Baseball may be the American pastime, but it is only racing that seems to appeal to Marylanders across the board. While chugging beer and waiting for the 8th (on the turf), I observed two English teachers from Patterson High, the heir to about one-third of Frederick County, and a guy who was obsessively picking up discarded tickets, trying to find an accidentally-lost winner.

I watched and bet on four races and only one brought me any return whatsoever, and that was fairly dismal. Let's hope that the W&M paradigm holds fast: if it does, I should be doing pretty well by Preakness Day, and the last day of racing season should allow me to retire within the year.