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Derby provides a slice of Americana
By Ed McNamara
Special to ESPN.com
|  | | Night or Derby Day, there is just something special about Churchill Downs. |
The world can't get enough of American culture, if you can call it that. Much of it is stupid, instant and recycled, but that only makes it more appealing. Sex, violence and materialism are its holy trinity, and corporate logos its icons. You can't beat our special effects or cool graphics, either. From Hong Kong to London, from Buenos Aires to Norway, this stuff sells.
When it comes to staging events that are larger than life, the USA can't be topped, either. In a world where the average attention span is getting shorter by the day, it makes sense that a two-minute animal act is our most fascinating national festival. For a riveting spectacle, you can't match the Kentucky Derby. As the humorist Irvin S. Cobb said, "Until you've been to the Kentucky Derby, you ain't never been nowhere and you ain't never seen nothin'."
The sage of Paducah, Ky., wasn't lying.
The Derby is a glorious rite of spring that never gets old, a tidal wave of energy and emotion that sweeps away logic and restraint. It's all about excess, sentimentality and going for glory.
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HOW TO MAKE
A MINT JULEP
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Tradition can be wonderful, but at times it just makes you wonder.
The mint julep, the official drink of the Kentucky Derby, sounds a lot
better than it tastes.
For those of you who will be partying at home as you watch your horses finish up the track in America's Race, here's the recipe:
Start by making simple syrup -- a cup of cold water, two cups of
sugar. Boil the sugar and water for five minutes, let it cool and add mint
leaves.
Let the syrup "brew" for 12 hours, then stir and strain to remove
the mint.
Mix two shots of bourbon with one shot of simple syrup and pour
into a glass filled with crushed ice.
Stir and stick in a fresh mint sprig (it resembles a hardy weed).
Think of it as a snowcone that gives you a buzz. But there's no accounting for taste, especially when such a second-rate concoction is so popular that it's almost heretical to criticize it.
To a connoisseur of good bourbon, it seems like a sinful waste, and to this
former bartender, the mint sprig is extremely optional.
The best that can be said of the mint julep is the more of them you
drink, the better you like them. During Derby week, approximately 90,000
will be sold at Churchill Downs -- at $5 or $6 a pop.
As a bonus, revelers get to keep the attractive souvenir glass as a memento of the day they spent walking around in a haze beneath the Twin Spires.
--Ed McNamara
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Every nation defines itself by its mass rituals, and the Derby tells a lot about the values of this pagan land. It's pure Americana, and being there is essential. No matter how sophisticated that television technology becomes, the scene does not come across on the tube.
From the crush of the paddock and the lilting melody of "My Old Kentucky Home" to the second the gates open, the pressure comes to a boil. Then it's an explosion of passion, from the roar at the start until the winner passes the finish line beneath the shadow of the Twin Spires. As they used to say in the Sixties, "Cosmic rush, man."
The quest to win the Derby becomes an addiction that gives very rich owners delusions of grandeur about mediocre horses. Every year people gladly
fork over $30,000 for the privilege of seeing their horse parade to the post
with a jockey clad in their stable colors. Few ever admit that their
no-hoper is in way over his head.
"There's only one Derby," trainer Todd Pletcher said. "That's why I think everyone is willing to step up and take a shot."
Whether they have any ammunition often doesn't matter.
The desire to pick a winner makes it the most overanalyzed race on the calendar. Betting it right provides an awesome ego boost that has little to do with money. Derby scores are remembered in detail and savored for years, long after the profits have been squandered. So are wagering disasters.
J.J. Pletcher, Todd's father and a career horseman, has a sad story
from 1995, when Todd was an assistant to D. Wayne Lukas and was helping to
train Thunder Gulch.
"Once Todd got him in Florida, I bet $200 to win on Thunder Gulch
every time he ran," J.J. told me recently. "I cashed three or four bets, and
then I lost when he ran fourth in the Blue Grass. So I didn't bet him in the
Derby when he went off at 24-1. I was throwing rocks at myself when he won."
But amid the chaos, vulgarity and betting tales is the yearning to
become part of something that existed long before you did and will be around
long after you've been processed into eternity. Very little lasts in this
sad, bad world, but a Derby triumph may be among the rare exceptions.
"Who knows how you win the Kentucky Derby?" said trainer Frank Brothers, who never has and who won't have a chance this year because his
contender, Mighty, got hurt. "I think it's the toughest race in the world to
win."
That's only one reason why it keeps everybody coming back.
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