The Second Race by Davis W. Morton

THE SECOND RACE / 1997 / oil on canvas / 24" x 32"  SOLD... Read a painting comment below...

      If someone in Baltimore or Washington, DC wants to go to the race track, Pimlico or Laurel is normally where they go. This painting combines images from the two.
     When fate presents us with an excellent opportunity, some people are too timid to take a chance that should be taken. At the other end of the gambling spectrum, other people completely waste their talents and their energy trying to control the uncontrollable. Then they often blame their mistakes on fate. Gambling, good and bad, runs the course between these two extremes and in my paintings that deal with gambling I'm never trying to sit in judgment.
     The gamblers in this painting have already won or lost the first race but it is not time yet to be concerned. To keep the odds from going up, it's time to protect their strategies from prying eyes and to fine-tune them before the second race.   Using their own systems to beat the odds, they bet on every race.  So they won't know until after the seventh race if they've had, a good day at the track or not.