The biggest problem the sport has had for a very long time

[Calzone Lord]

Obviously -- the betting pools in a horse race is the market.

A lot of people who bet on horse racing are brutally clueless and constantly make poor assumptions and terrible decisions.

These bettors, by and large, don't make much of an impact on the market. They're often dopey people betting between $2 to $50 a race -- and most often towards the low side.

Generally, the money coming from competent players and those incredibly sharp bots that bet thousands of dollars a race will make the market.

Obviously, if you're as good as 'The Market' -- you'll lose about 20% of every dollar you bet. It's a very stiff tax.

This, is the biggest roadblock for the sport. In the "Glory days" when only baseball was a bigger deal than horse racing -- it wasn't that unusual for horse bettors to become spectacularly wealthy. In fact, a few horse bettors became among the richest people in the country and achieved celebrity in the press.

Now -- "new fans" must have an incredible amount of disposable time and disposable income -- and they must truly pay the piper if they want to have a chance to eventually someday develop into horse players who have a tremendous enough advantage over the market to be profitable players.

Obviously -- once they get to the point of being an advantage player -- the amount of money they bet is going to absolutely sky-rocket. In a non Pari-Mutual system ... it was absolutely nothing for a guy like Plunger Walton to bet the equivalent of several hundred thousand dollars on a horse race.

I learned the game at a very young age. My grandfather owned Salvatore Builders and was one of the richest men in the 3rd largest city in Pennsylvania. My father owned two car dealerships before his 21st birthday and ran one of the largest new car stores in Florida. My mother and step father own the biggest auto-body shop in the city -- accidents happen like crazy in the cold winters here.

I got to handicap and bet on horse races every weekend of my childhood because of my grandfather. I got paid when he won and obviously lost nothing whenever lost. I was, in a perverted sense, an advantage player even when I was 11-year-old because of that system.

I had a father and grandfather who constantly encouraged me to bet horses, and gave me a lot of incentive to at a young age -- the people who don't have that advantage are in a VERY tough position and will find this game too tough. To be in that position, playing with your own money to start, and feeling losses... the fences will seem like they're 600 feet. The fences for Pittsburgh Phil were slow pitch softball or T-ball fences by comparison.

The biggest challenge facing horse racing -- without question -- is that the game is WAY too tough for new fans to be able to feel any hope. Way too hard for them to feel what it's like to win for an extended period.

This is not an easy game to learn. It's not an easy game to beat. And now casinos and lotteries are everywhere. A lot of sucker money has left the Market because of it.

Horse racing is not going anywhere. It's just not going forward until addresses it's draconian takeout rates. They're a burden too heavy and they make the game hopeless and not worth the effort for the new fan who will have to take his early lumps under any system or in any time period.