(or “How To Attend A Major Sporting Event And Watch Less Than Five Seconds Of It”)

by Karaoke Craig

It’s an unusual, but apparently universally accepted, method ushering fans into an event for which they have paid more than $50.

Imagine showing up for an AFC title game between Pittsburgh and Miami, at Dolphins Stadium. Ticket in hand, you allow two layers of security to paw over you and your belongings, judiciously inspecting everything you’ve decided you can’t live without for the next few hours. Only then are you permitted to walk a few more yards to the ticket takers, who scan the crumpled E-ticket you produce from your pocket and send you on your way.

Finally! Now it’s just a few hundred-yards walk under a noisy, dank tunnel (with hoards of equally delighted fans stomping along) and you’ve reached your destination just 45 minutes or so after you abandoned your car.

Sunshine! You’ve made it to the exact spot your ticket entitles you to go. But you won’t be sitting on the 50-yard line, or even within 50 yards of the field. In fact, you’re not in the stadium – you’re in the tailgate section outside. You won’t be able to see the game from this vantage point, but rest assured it will be carried on closed-circuit televisions conveniently placed a half-mile away. And if the glare from the sun obscures any of the unrecognizable moving figures on the screen, at least the cheers of the crowd will serve to let you know that the Dolphins are, in fact, winning. You think.

That’s my best approximation of what it felt like to enter Pimlico Race Course (note: after spending nearly seven hours there yesterday, I had to look up the actual name of the track) for the 133rd running of the Preakness Stakes. I’d bought an infield ticket and persuaded three friends from Philadelphia to meet me there with aspirations of enjoying a drunken, frat-style drinking orgy on shimmering grass in 75-degree weather and, ideally, finding myself wowed by the energy and spectacle of big-time horse racing.

Within seconds of surfacing from the tunnel that sneaks beneath a section of the track into the infield, I abruptly dropped all hopes of witnessing any substantial horse racing.

In front of me was not a freshly groomed dirt track decorated by excitedly trotting colts and their steaming, oat-y piles of byproduct, but an enormous fenced-in herd of minimally clothed 20-somethings (sadly, the previous modifier applied more often to the males than the females) frolicking in a sea of empty beer cans and port-o-potty seepage.

My disposition, sunk by the stark absence of horse-related festoonery, was quickly buoyed by the realization that despite the discouraging ratio of colts to fillies at this particular race (so to speak), it was my kind of party.

My companions and I had endured a fairly grueling adventure to get to our current spot in the world. After waking at the crack of dawn (just before 9 a.m., I reckon), we left our respective cities and drove two hours to outer Baltimore. I went to Wal-Mart and purchased a Styrofoam cooler large enough (I thought) to transport Anheuser-Busch’s entire April output, plus 60 Bud lights, four Gatorades, three bags of ice, and a second, smaller cooler when I discovered I had not nearly enough space in the original Coolersaurus. I also had bought a wooden-box game called ‘washers,’ with which I expect my readership is likely familiar, to divert us between the races and attract (female) attention to our gathering. My cohorts contributed to the outfit by managing to rouse our Van Winklish friend Ajay prematurely from his slumber and stuffing him in a Chevy Malibu bound for Crabtown.

When we separately approached Baltimore, I got a phone call from the Philadelphia trio asking if I’d located a hotel for us to spend the night. I hadn’t; I’d suggested they do it the night before while I was out late at work, but instead they decided to get hammered at the bars and pass out. We agreed to drive around the Pimlico area until one of us found a hotel, and call the other car on arrival. They found one first, and I used my GPS to meet them there. Unfortunately, my GPS was taking me to the wrong motel, which I realized as I whizzed past the proper one. I instinctively performed a frantic U-turn, hit my right front tire on the far curb, and rolled into the Pikesville Econo-Lodge with three inflated tires and their no-longer-inflated sibling.

Upon my semi-triumphant arrival, they informed me that after a survey of the concierge, it was discovered that this particular motel offered a room with a king-sized bed (for no more than two people) at $130, plus bullet holes in the wall. (The neighborhood we were in did not provide a favorable degree of peace-of-mind. Have you seen the Wire?) We quickly decided that one of the Philadelphians (Steve) would stay sober enough to drive the others home following the race, and that I would crash with some Baltimore friends I’d hoped to meet up with later. Glad I went to the trouble of wrecking my car in pursuit of the Econo-Lodge.

Like Jimmie Johnson’s pit crew team, we furiously set about changing the tire on my car (I clocked us at 14.9 seconds – not bad on short notice) while politely informing the hovering taxi drivers that no, we were not in need of a ride from here to the track three blocks away in exchange for $20. The spare doughnut in my trunk proved fantastically useless (I may as well have affixed an unused ribbed condom to the wheel) when my car limped into the Firestone branch we’d uncovered half-a-block away (God bless the iPhone).

I dealt with the tire people swiftly and politely – it was about 12:30, and we’d hoped to be in the stadium by 11 a.m. No, I don’t want the “performance package.” No, I don’t want the warranty – I’m fairly certain I had a warranty on the tire you’re replacing, I just don’t remember where. But it’s not here. Yes, if you please, lock the key inside the car when you’re finished and accept payment now, because later you’ll be closed and I’ll be too drunk to collect my vehicle anyway.

I wasn’t too worried about leaving my 2001 Nissan Altima in such dire straits as to be unprotected in the streets of lesser (the opposite of “greater”?) Baltimore overnight – I probably would have been pretty pumped if it had been stolen, at this point in its life (alas, it was not.) $80 dollars poorer, I climbed into the Malibu and we were finally off for the track.

Parking for the Preakness is dicey – you don’t want to park too far away, but you don’t want to pay more than $15, and you don’t want to park somewhere with less-than-vigilant security. Heading for a parking lot I’d been advised to use by a Preakness veteran, we eschewed a group of folks – let’s call them Obama supporters – urging us to pay $15 and park in their yard. Turning into a side street in the woodsy neighborhood that surrounds the track, we immediately saw another group of folks – let’s call them McCain supporters – offering to let us park in their yard for only $20. We happily agreed.

(Note: I’m not saying we chose the lot we did because it was hosted by McCain supporters – the street we’d turned on was a dead end, and we just threw our hands up and decided to make moves quickly. But I will allow that their, ahem, political preference might have otherwise helped their case, in that particular neighborhood).

I got out of the car and hoisted Coolersaurus onto my head, balanced by my outstretched hands. As we trudged the few remaining blocks to the track, various Obama supporters with shopping carts or hand trucks offered to help me transport Coolersaurus (which was the maximum permissible size for entry and contained no less than 45 beers and two bags of ice) to the gate for an irresistible price – $3.

I declined. I am a binge-drinking veteran, I informed them, and this was no load burdensome enough to deter me.

“Cheap-ass,” they muttered each time.

After a thorough pawing-over of our materials by the second, more intense wave of security and a hardy trek through the tunnel, there we were – staring, mesmerized, at the biggest party any of us had ever been to (the Pop-Secret 500 included).

We searched and searched for an available piece of grass on which to set up shop. The first several we came upon were mirages. A green strip littered with relatively few beer cans turned out to be a major port-o-potty throughway, and thus not fit for human occupation. Another choice spot turned out to be inside the confines of a booth for Hott 91 FM “The Buzz,” and to park there meant you had to sign up for a MasterCard and free t-shirt and likely be harassed by interns from some assclown’s drive-time radio show.

Finally, we found a spot no larger than our collective shadows, and dropped Coolersaurus on the muddy turf. The spot was clearly an important thoroughfare in the network of human migration between the badlands of inner-infield and the port-o-potties/betting windows, but we found that our occupation of it merely caused some travelers to seek alternate routes. Others, of course, continued to walk right through our game of washers without regard for organized competition.

Still, we had stopped moving for the first time in five hours, and were happily shotgunning beers and chucking metal washers at opposite wooden boxes as we tried to catch our BAC’s up to those of our neighbors.

The sun was shining, beer was flowing, horses were running (somewhere). It was perfect.

Then, someone lobbed a beer.

Reports vary, but according to an account on the internet it began with some cretin standing on top of a port-o-potty who decided he’d hurl his aluminum Natty Lite menacingly into some bystanders. One of these people, apparently unaware of the genesis of the projectile, did what any red-blooded American would do in the circumstances: he wantonly hurled a beer can of his own in no particular direction.

Within seconds, beer cans were flying left and right, at times appearing in the sky with barely enough warning to duck or brace for impact. A sort of no-man’s-land formed between our side and the people closer to the port-o-pottys, and beer cans flew back-and-forth. But some of the people hurling beer cans from the back were not strong-armed enough to reach enemy lines, and friendly fire casualties mounted. (Here’s video!)

Bear in mind that these were not empties; people (generally young, male McCain supporters) were pulling fresh beers out of their coolers, popping the top as if it were a grenade’s pin, and heaving them into clusters of people.

The race fans in attendance had varying reactions to the beer-battle. Ajay doubled over in laughter as people nearby took direct hits, then deftly plucked a Styrofoam cooler lid from the ground and swung it above his head just in time to send the contents of a zooming lagered missile spraying harmlessly over its targets. Steve, ever resourceful, snatched up any unopened beers that landed near us and shoved them into Coolersaurus. Karl merely rolled his eyes, perhaps wishing he was at home playing video games.

The dominant reaction, however, was to start punching the stranger most convenient to one’s proximity. Fistfights broke out with dizzying frequency.

Overheard in the aftermath:

    Ron Burgundy: Boy, that escalated quickly… I mean, that really got out of hand fast!
    Champ Kind: It jumped up a notch!
    Ron Burgundy: It did, didn’t it?
    Brick Tamland: Yeah, I stabbed a man in the heart!
    Ron Burgundy: I saw that! Brick killed a guy! Did you throw a trident?
    Brick Tamland: Yeah, there were horses, and a man on fire, and I killed a guy with a trident!
    Ron Burgundy: Brick, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that. You should probably find yourself a safehouse or a relative close by. Lay low for a while, because you’re probably wanted for murder.

Anyway, I’m pretty sure I saw someone get stabbed with a trident.

Regardless, I took it upon myself to get involved. Maybe I was at the point where the beer was making my decisions for me, but I jumped into various dog piles, never throwing a punch but yanking people apart. Breaking up fights is the most fun you can have in a fight without getting escorted off the premises by authorities. Also, I can’t abide watching someone have his head kicked in by five dudes he merely threw a beer can at. Fortunately, none of the people I yanked out of a scrum took issue with it. One such fellow I pulled away and tossed to the side. He immediately caught his balance and glanced up at me, ready to charge. I clenched my fists. He suddenly stopped in his tracks, turned and scampered away as if he’d realized I was a member of the NYPD. (Note: I am not, nor have I ever been, in the NYPD. But my parents did take a trip to New York when I was 14 and bought me a souvenir NYPD shirt, which looks exactly like something a New York City police officer might wear on his weekend trip to the Preakness.)

The fights went on and on, as did the beer-chucking. Event Staffers (as denoted by their bright yellow t-shirts and total lack of training) filed in, police hauled people away, and EMT’s applied medical attention to those who’d had their faces kicked in. A stealth bomber swooped menacingly over the crowd, and Navy paratroopers dropped in, streaming blue-and-yellow smoke. Those were either air support for one of the beer-chucking factions, or the flyover/color guard for the pre-race ceremony. I don’t think anyone knows for sure.

My lone casualty of the beer wars was my right flip-flop, which was unfortunate because the ground consisted of a mixture of mud, crushed beer cans, beer, blood and aids, not to mention the odd broken glass bottle. The bathroom represented a serious downside of having just one flip-flop.

I approached a group of Event Staffers standing together in the vicinity of the initial beer skirmish, waiting and watching in case the mercury again rose to the point of fisticuffs. I stumbled up to them and informed them that I was thereby authorizing an all points bulletin for one (1) brown flip-flop, most likely lost in a puddle of AIDS somewhere, with an estimated street value of 37 cents.

They glared at me until I stopped talking, and either ignored me or decided that I had better be kept an eye on.

Eventually, a group of helpful comrades pointed out my erstwhile footwear, lying in a pile of crushed beer cans. I retrieved it and rewarded them with a beer can, happy to no longer have to stand in pee every time I went to the bathroom.

It was lucky timing, for sure, because the TV screen suspended above the far rim of the track indicated the 11th race had ended and the man attraction was due to begin in less than an hour. My friends and I departed our station (from which my washer box game was immediately stolen) and headed to the fence near the middle of the track, on the opposite side of the grandstand. I climbed the chain link fence and rested my arms on the top rail, with perhaps the best vantage point I’ve had for any sporting event in which I wasn’t participating. The only thing separating me from the ghost of Barbaro, at that point, was the width of the grass track on which the undercard races are run and a few authority figures from various branches of law enforcement.

(A few seconds later, I was much closer to the track; the fence I had climbed was actually a gate, which some of the Event Staffers swung open to allow some sort of golf cart/ambulance to pass through. I could have leapt from the chain links and scurried onto the track if I had been so inclined, but I’m pretty sure I would have been tackled and Eight Belles-ified right where I fell.)

Anyway, one of the Event Staffers told me to climb down a few minutes before the race, and then a State Trooper told me to get down when I jumped back up again as the gates opened. But I still had a terrific view through the chain links of the field when it actually came storming by. Big Brown was in third at that point, and just making his move. All the people who had been punching each other in the face and hurling beers at each other all afternoon cheered and clapped in unison as they saw (on the TV) Big Brown make his way into first and easily prolong everyone’s hopes of witnessing a Triple Crown winner. Giant Moons, the horse Ajay and I had bet on (to show) because his named sounded humorous, finished eighth — I stuck the ticket in my mouth, chewed it up and spit it out. But we didn’t care – we’d just seen, for five seconds, a horse who by all accounts is one of the most special thoroughbreds of all time after spending five hours pre-gaming for just that moment.

Despite the headache of traveling into Baltimore, paying an arm and a leg for the festivities, and trying to survive the beer wars, the payoff was more than worth it. So what if we only got to watch five seconds of racing? They turned out to be just the right five seconds to watch.