JoeKristufek

It was a fateful day in downtown Chicago in the summer of 1987. I was a Columbia College student working part time at the Sears Tower, looking for a little excitement between work and school.
As luck would have it, Illinois’ first ever off track betting facility opened on the corner of Jackson and Franklin, and it just so happened that I had to walk past there everyday to go to class.
The neon sign got my attention, and I wandered in. I felt like Luke Skywalker walking into that freak show cantina in the original Star Wars, but the beer was cold, and you could bet legally! I frequented that place way too often, and lost entirely too much money. Horse racing contributed to my extended five-year college life. As time passed, I started to understand that there was a method to understanding this chaos. Every race is like a puzzle, and if you’re right, they pay you for it! One day I looked up at one of the television screens on the first floor of the OTB. There was some guy named Tony Cobitz, dressed in a suit and tie, in the middle of the Arlington paddock on a gorgeous summer day. Did they actually PAY him to talk about horse racing????? At the time I was a journalism student with a half-ass goal of becoming a sports reporter. Then it hit me. I want to be Tony Cobitz. I want somebody to pay ME to go to the track every day. Here I am, 16 years later. I am wildly competitive, yet gracious in defeat, and have a knack for handicapping everything that moves. I shoot a mean game of stick, music is food for my soul, and I multi-task in my sleep. Round 'em up, put 'em in the gate, and let's get this party started!

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