The 2004 Las Vegas Hilton SuperContest drew a record 411 entrants. When the smoke cleared, Racetrack Ray, ?Doc,? and Big Peter were among the big winners. The three first-time contestants, collectively known by the alias Tiger Wilson, divvied up $131,520. They now plan to open their own tout service.
Racetrack Ray and ?Doc? ? more formally Raymond Maternowksi and Myron Wilson - became buddies while working for prominent sports gambler Tony Salinas. Racetrack Ray was one of Salinas?s original customer service reps when his firm was known as High Rollers.
They are something of an odd couple. Racetrack Ray spent almost 23 years on the Detroit police force. He patrolled some of the meanest streets in the city and has the battle scars to prove it.
Doc ran a bar and was a concert promoter in Peoria, Illinois. He moved to Las Vegas after his bar ? a juke joint in a converted warehouse ? was bulldozed under eminent domain to make way for a highway expansion.
When Salinas closed his office, Racetrack Ray became a full-time horseplayer. Doc plays the ponies too, but irregularly. An accomplished chef who has competed in national cooking competitions, Doc recently worked as a ?greeter? for a time-share broker, steering tourists into sales presentations.
Racetrack Ray?s favorite hangout is the race book at the Boardwalk Hotel, a few furlongs from his condominium at the Jockey Club. He and Doc fine-tuned their battle plan for the SuperContest here. But their model dictated a third partner and three years elapsed before the duet became a trio.
Once a beehive of activity, the Boardwalk horse parlor became largely deserted when the big plungers took their action offshore. There were times in recent years when the only fellows in the place were Racetrack Ray, Doc, and the late Peter Kowalski, Sr., a retiree from Milwaukee. Kowalski?s son of the same name ? Big Peter ? ultimately became the third spoke in the wheel.
Each week, Racetrack Ray, Doc, and Big Peter independently made five selections and two alternate picks. Their weekly contest plays were carved from the consensus.
Some weeks this stratagem failed to produce the requisite five plays. When this happened, the team captain made the final determination. The captain was the person with the best record the previous week.
Sticking tight to this script, the triumvirate finished 52-31-1, a record unsurpassed but matched by two other entrants.
Racetrack Ray believes that the team was successful because each member had a different style of handicapping. Trend-oriented, Ray credits Al O?Donnell?s ?Pointspread Playbook? with being particularly helpful.
Doc weaves emotion into his analyses. He puts stock in old-fashioned precepts rooted in scheduling dynamics. He looks for things like ?sandwich situations.?
Big Peter, the pup of the trio at 49, crunches statistics. ?I couldn?t explain what he does,? says Racetrack Ray, ?but I knew we needed a computer whiz like him. Whenever I overhear someone say he has a virus in his mouse, I don?t have a clue what he?s talking about.?
The sidebar to this story is that the boys got lucky after the fact. They were overpaid to the tune of nearly $58,000, inflating each share by $19,180.
The contest rules specified that in the event of a tie, the first place finisher would be the contestant with the best record over the final three weeks of the season. Through an oversight, the tiebreaker rule was lost in the fine print until after the checks were cut. Team Tiger Wilson actually finished in a two-way tie for second, rather than a three-way tie for first.
Our savants were encouraged to refund the overage. Perks were offered as an inducement. But Hilton management quickly decided that it would not press the issue.
Racetrack Ray had no knowledge of this until he read it in the papers. Unknown to his partners, he had hightailed it out of town for some rest and relaxation in Pahrump. He doesn?t own a cell phone.
Racetrack Ray says that he would have voted to return the money. Doc and Big Peter say they were hamstrung by Ray?s inaccessibility. Whatever their decision, it had to be unanimous.
If it?s any consolation to the nice folks at the SuperBook, they earned the respect of local gamblers by the classy manner in which they addressed the snafu. In hindsight, it?s no wonder that our colleague Fezzik named the Hilton the best sports book in the city.
Racetrack Ray and ?Doc? ? more formally Raymond Maternowksi and Myron Wilson - became buddies while working for prominent sports gambler Tony Salinas. Racetrack Ray was one of Salinas?s original customer service reps when his firm was known as High Rollers.
They are something of an odd couple. Racetrack Ray spent almost 23 years on the Detroit police force. He patrolled some of the meanest streets in the city and has the battle scars to prove it.
Doc ran a bar and was a concert promoter in Peoria, Illinois. He moved to Las Vegas after his bar ? a juke joint in a converted warehouse ? was bulldozed under eminent domain to make way for a highway expansion.
When Salinas closed his office, Racetrack Ray became a full-time horseplayer. Doc plays the ponies too, but irregularly. An accomplished chef who has competed in national cooking competitions, Doc recently worked as a ?greeter? for a time-share broker, steering tourists into sales presentations.
Racetrack Ray?s favorite hangout is the race book at the Boardwalk Hotel, a few furlongs from his condominium at the Jockey Club. He and Doc fine-tuned their battle plan for the SuperContest here. But their model dictated a third partner and three years elapsed before the duet became a trio.
Once a beehive of activity, the Boardwalk horse parlor became largely deserted when the big plungers took their action offshore. There were times in recent years when the only fellows in the place were Racetrack Ray, Doc, and the late Peter Kowalski, Sr., a retiree from Milwaukee. Kowalski?s son of the same name ? Big Peter ? ultimately became the third spoke in the wheel.
Each week, Racetrack Ray, Doc, and Big Peter independently made five selections and two alternate picks. Their weekly contest plays were carved from the consensus.
Some weeks this stratagem failed to produce the requisite five plays. When this happened, the team captain made the final determination. The captain was the person with the best record the previous week.
Sticking tight to this script, the triumvirate finished 52-31-1, a record unsurpassed but matched by two other entrants.
Racetrack Ray believes that the team was successful because each member had a different style of handicapping. Trend-oriented, Ray credits Al O?Donnell?s ?Pointspread Playbook? with being particularly helpful.
Doc weaves emotion into his analyses. He puts stock in old-fashioned precepts rooted in scheduling dynamics. He looks for things like ?sandwich situations.?
Big Peter, the pup of the trio at 49, crunches statistics. ?I couldn?t explain what he does,? says Racetrack Ray, ?but I knew we needed a computer whiz like him. Whenever I overhear someone say he has a virus in his mouse, I don?t have a clue what he?s talking about.?
The sidebar to this story is that the boys got lucky after the fact. They were overpaid to the tune of nearly $58,000, inflating each share by $19,180.
The contest rules specified that in the event of a tie, the first place finisher would be the contestant with the best record over the final three weeks of the season. Through an oversight, the tiebreaker rule was lost in the fine print until after the checks were cut. Team Tiger Wilson actually finished in a two-way tie for second, rather than a three-way tie for first.
Our savants were encouraged to refund the overage. Perks were offered as an inducement. But Hilton management quickly decided that it would not press the issue.
Racetrack Ray had no knowledge of this until he read it in the papers. Unknown to his partners, he had hightailed it out of town for some rest and relaxation in Pahrump. He doesn?t own a cell phone.
Racetrack Ray says that he would have voted to return the money. Doc and Big Peter say they were hamstrung by Ray?s inaccessibility. Whatever their decision, it had to be unanimous.
If it?s any consolation to the nice folks at the SuperBook, they earned the respect of local gamblers by the classy manner in which they addressed the snafu. In hindsight, it?s no wonder that our colleague Fezzik named the Hilton the best sports book in the city.
