Since CC mentioned Connie Merjos, trackman extrordinaire, on the Ragozin site--

As I have mentioned here before, Connie was the one who taught Ragozin about run-ups, clocking and live ground-- he was making his own figures incorporating ground loss before he met Ragozin. He also was the owner and handicapper for the famous "Beard" tip sheet in New York. Every trackman for Ragozin and Thoro-Graph who followed was either taught directly or indirectly by Connie.

Anyway, last winter my girlfriend and I went to Puerto Rico, where Connie has retired, and spent some time with him. She wanted to do an oral history with him-- not only about the track, but about playing the oboe with Stravinsky and others. He has great stories-- like the one about the cops chasing him and another musician from a brothel and through the backyards in Lousiana for pot posession, at a time and place where getting caught could have meant 20 years...

Since Connie has the only known figures for El Commandante, we decided to do the interview at the track. We had been there about an hour when Connie started to sweat and get nauseous, throwing up a couple of times at the dining room table. The track doctor came over (no one spoke much English, I don't speak Spanish), took Connie's blood pressure, and it was some crazy high number. They rushed us into the track ambulance (normally used for spills), I went with Connie, Chris drove behind us. They had him on oxygen, and the 2 ambulance guys didn't speak any English either, and we got caught in a traffic jam... it didn't look good for a while. It took us about 40 minutes to get there.

Anyway, Connie made it. They got his BP down, and eventually decided the episode was caused by dehydration, which might have something to do with his drinking a bottle of scotch a day, and no water.

Anyway-- CC, since you seem to know Connie, you know that there may never have been any racetrack regular with a better reputation for character and ethics-- he is the original stand up guy. Ask him what he thought about Len's book. If you don't have his phone number e-mail me, and I'll give it to you. Since the tone of your post was a little better than your most recent effort I'll let the "vitriol" crack go, but I would like to know where you found a simulcast book on sale for $25.

By the way, I agree with you that one race samples are useless for comparing the products and deciding which is better, especially when those races are cherry-picked retroactively. That's why we put ALL the data up in the Red Board Room EVERY day, and why we try to educate every one about the decision making process that determines the numbers assigned-- that way they can decide for themselves what's logical, and what's not.



TGJB