Last night we visited Canterbury Park in Shakopee to celebrate our friend Gina’s birthday. Our group had two reserved tables on the upper level just off the finish line. I’ve never been up there before and I thought it was really nice - table service and bet runners meant you never had to leave for anything all night, if you didn’t want to.

I used to bet on the horses a lot during my high school and college days - handicapping has a lot of appeal to people who like math and numbers. Never was really very good at it, but I have a lot of theories to use to help me place bets.

Before leaving home, I printed out the jockey and trainer stats for the current meet, along with the Daily Racing Form’s listings for the night. My biggest strategy to making picks is to look at which horses have the best jockeys and trainers. I placed about $45 in bets and left with about $110, so it was a good night for gambling.

It was also fun spending time with our group of friends. We love our kids, but you really need to get away every once and a while. Happy birthday to Gina and thanks for the invitation. Oh, and where are we runnin’?

Last night we went to the 2009 edition of the Wild Select-A-Seat season ticket holder event and had a blast. I’ll write more on this over at Hockey in Minnesota soon, but I just wanted to link to the photos in the private section of the 7 Minute Miles photo gallery.

My friend Brad invited me to a Timberwolves game tonight at Target Center. I’m pretty sure the last basketball game I went to was at least 10 years ago - not really much of an NBA fan, I guess.

I knew things were bad across the river compared to the Wild, but wow. I sort of felt the same way I did when going to Circuit City just before they shut down. Attendance was supposedly 13,119, but I’d be surprised if there were half that many in the building.

The Wolves lost their 11th straight home game 110-99 to the Washington Wizards, a team that ranks lower than Minnesota in the standings and lacks any big-name stars. I felt sorry for the guys trying to sell season tickets after the game - even at $5 per game, that’s a hard job…

It’s been ten years since my first (and only) fantasy football league, but the neighbors asked us to fill an opening in their league this year. We plan to set it and forget it for the most part, but here is the starting lineup (courtesy of fanball.com).

I do most of my golf writing at the Golfing in Minnesota website, but this post has nothing to do with Minnesota, so here you go…

Two years ago at the U.S. Open I attended at Winged Foot in New York, I snapped this picture of Padraig Harrington during a practice round. He was very nice to us as he went by and I was so pleased today when he repeated as champion golfer of the year at the Open Championship.

His second shot on the par-five seventeenth hole at Royal Birkdale today may be one of the best pressure shots I’ve ever watched during a major.

Cheers, Padraig!

Last week we also stopped out to Canterbury Park for buck night (and to celebrate our friend Todd’s birthday).

I used to like horse racing a lot while I was in college. The Daily Racing Form has tons of stats and I had all sorts of techniques to try to beat the odds. Like all gambling, though, the only way to win is to become the house.

No big winners or losers among our bets - but then again, my bankroll was only about $10.

Kid two came along and loves watching the big animals up close. The night’s races run pretty late, though, so we left before the end.

Can’t beat $1 nachos and Mountain Dew though…