In the winter, I am a snowbird. If I can get to Florida or Texas or anywhere where it’s hot and there’s a dog track, I’m going. However, when it gets hot in the south, I head to my family’s old camp in Maine. I guess that turns me into a penguin, because I go outside to cool off, whereas in winter, I go outside to warm up, which turns me into a snow bird.
This summer, there is a heat wave that has managed to reach even the generally colder areas of New England. Trust me, when you’re over 89 in this part of Maine, it’s unusual. And when the humidity rises along with it, it’s miserable. The local harness track has to hose down the horses and at times it seems the drivers have been running under the hose as well. Our outfields are down and so are we, and when it comes to playing races at the local OTB, we have to factor in the heat.
Although we can only play horses in Maine, if you play horses or dogs anywhere in the US At this time, you should check the weather channel before you start placing bets. Today I got a tweet saying that Delaware Park closed after the second race because the riders didn’t think it was safe to ride at 101ºC. I think it would have been obvious to management, without the riders having to point out. It is clear that riding in those temperatures is the courtship of heatstroke for horses AND riders.
The same goes for greyhounds. Although many of them are used to running in fairly warm temperatures, because they run regularly in states like Florida, Texas, and Arizona, when it’s too hot they can run into trouble too. And even if they don’t suffer from heatstroke or suffer any adverse effects, when it’s really hot, it affects their performance. That is why I recommend that you model yourself in snowbirds in winter and penguins in summer.
In the winter, when the winds blow snow into the dogs’ faces and the only thing colder than the track surface is the heart of the legislator who sponsored the Illegal Internet Gambling Act, I hit tracks in Florida, Arizona and Texas. In the summer, when the tar is melting in the Palm Beach parking lot and the tracks are red and drenched with sweat, I look at Dubuque, Bluffs Run, and maybe West Virginia, though it can get pretty hot there too.
The weather is almost always a disadvantage, but even more so when it is extreme. So keep that in mind and make sure it’s not raining, snowing, blowing a gale, too hot, or too cold before attempting to win at the dog track. It’s hard enough to be disadvantaged in a race without having the weather against you.