THE TRACK: A Day in the Life of Belmont Park

Surface's Roundup at the Double Diamond (1974) was an extremely likable jawing-and-chawing cattle roundup on a sprawling Western ranch. The Track uses his old format and attention to the lingo in assembling a you-are-there day at the races--but this time out it's too real for anyone but habituÉs. The ordinary reader might as well be cast adrift in a Joycean pub as try to decipher the outpouring of horse lore, statistics, juicy humor, and rare arcana of jockeys and trainers. Meanwhile the typical day is reported in detail, With due note of the medical attention the horses get; the owners and track operators; the bettors and cashiers; and the races themselves. A final chapter is an elegiac look at the stud farms where the great winners are breeding or out to pasture. Writerly journalism for horseplayers.