Saturday started like many other days when I have to begin work at the office: Shower and shave. Eat a quick breakfast. Walk the dogs. Leave the house in Towson. Stop at Royal Farms for a 44 oz. Diet Coke. Drive downtown to The Sun building on Calvert Street.
Soon after the day will diverge greatly from the normal or routine. It is Preakness time again.
A majority of the staff covering the Preakness on Saturday arrived at the office around 9:30 a.m. At around 10 we all left, carpooling with two or three people per vehicle. Traffic was still light at this point and we found the assigned parking lots with little trouble. Staff photographer Lloyd Fox (left in photo) and myself rode to Pimlico with John Makely, the recently named multimedia video editor.
We had not seen much of Makely during the last few weeks. The veteran staff photographer recently became a father after his wife, Sun reporter Stacey Hirsch, gave birth to a baby girl. No one gets off Preakness Saturday for any reason, not even for a newborn in the family. After the one-day return to the fold John will head home for more time with the wife and kid before his official return to the workforce.
We rendezvous in a stunning dust-bag room barely larger than a closet under the old grandstand. In prior years, when not forgotten, it had been used for storage. Located next door was the large, triangular room where many of the other photographers had setup shop. Next to it was a Ladies room entrance that seemed out of place at the end of the long wooden corridor next to two rooms filled with loud and heavily geared photographers and editors. With our door opening directly into the thoroughfare under the stands, many a person stopped by and peeked in, often asking for such places as the Mens room or the “Triple Crown Room.” Four times I have covered Preakness and not once heard of that place. If it exists, please, someone let me know.
Robert Hamilton, assistant managing editor for News Photography, was in charge. He spent almost all of his day in the closet too close to the chicken wire and the passersby. He was kept company most of the time by Jeff Bill, deputy director of photography.
After getting my gear together and putting everything in place I realized what I left in my car: Eyeglasses. Doh! Not a total loss. I was wearing my new prescription sunglass, purchased for the aforementioned vacation. The main reason I forgot the eyeglasses my normal routine being thrown out of whack by the sunglasses. Because the forecast expected the rain to stay away until well after the race I left my raingear in Makely’s car. That decision would come to haunt me later in the day, just prior to the race, which I will note in Preakness Peek, Part 2.
So, sans regular eyeglasses, I head to work. This was my second time delving into the infamous infield where some 90,000 people were expected to be “partying,” and doing many another things, while supposedly having a good time. So into the darkness of the tunnel under the track I went…
I carry two bodies, the D2X with the 14mm f/2.8 and the 80-200 mm f/2.8 on the D2Xs. In my fanny pack there is the 17-55mm f/2.8, 1.4x teleconverter, SB-800 flash, spare cards, lens cleaning tissue pens and envelopes for captions.
Things were pretty slow from 11 a.m. onward as I roamed looking to photograph people having fun; or doing something stupid; or something unusual; or just silly. Having covered Preakness many times and looking back on coverage I have knowledge of what had been photographed and done in the past. Many excellent pictures have come out of the infield and I wanted very much to add a great one to the collection. So my eyes were intent on finding situations that might yield such an opportunity. In doing so I also had to make
sure I had photos that would serve the needs of the days coverage and provide content for the Web.
So I walked. And walked. Then I walked a little more. Weaving in and out of people, across marked and unmarked territory, stepping over yellow warning tape and kiddy pools full of ice and cans of beer I marched my way throughout much of the infield.
Along the journey I photographed a woman sunning herself with the crowd surrounding her and a friend; another woman drinking boxed wine, sans box, from the spigot; another woman shotgunning a beer. Wow, so much visual excitement I can barely contain myself. Walking in front of and around the stage, upon which scantily clad male and female contestants flaunted themselves, it was relatively calm. Little did I know this was the proverbial silence that precedes the storm.
A swing by the portable toilets, for a look at the lines and the men incapable of waiting to relieve themselves and doing so on outside of them, did not yield much I could share in a family newspaper. Unfortunately, I did not see anyone running atop the 40-some length of them at that time, so I continued my trek.
As time dragged on, moving closer to 12:30, I continued photographing a few things. A young man wearing a “beer patrol” helmet was very nice, sitting with his girlfriend, but I had a hard time figuring out why keep the facemask. Then I photograph more women drinking, both of whom were very nice, and a few men slamming down beers from funnels. More of the same was happening, drinking and the like, but not much else. Well, there were a lot of people standing on coolers or talking on cell phones, but they do not usually make for memorable photographic images.
However, by now the warmth of the morning glow was ceding way to the allure of the alcohol. More and more people were asking to get their pictures taken, posing as if I were a party-pic guy, and it was getting harder to shake them off.
A belligerent, shirtless young man started screaming at me “Take a photo of me and my beautiful body! Don’t you want to see a great body?!?!” All I could do was laugh and walk off and continue my search.
Passing the portable toilets again, the long lines continued with no one running atop them. More people demanding I take their picture, more beer and a lot more empty beer cans.
One nice guy caught my attention when he asked to take a picture with me on my own camera. Moved by his originality I obliged. I have no clue of his name, but his friend who took the picture held down the shutter and made eight or so images, hammering the motor drive before I stepped back to take control.
Moving into the infield where I originally started the amount of people felt to have doubled. There were many more drunks to deal with along the way, too. In one of the few places where people could actually see a horse race, part of the reason for this bacchanal devoted to excess, I tried to make a photograph with crowd and horses about as close as they’d be all day. But I blew it. My aim of the camera was incorrect as I tried a Hail Mary (holding the camera above the head, guessing the composition) over the fence with the crowd next to it and the horses racing by on the turf. Blew that one big time.
The time neared 1 p.m. Only 45 minutes left until deadline. The pressure is starting to build and I can feel it in the base of my skull like a dull thud will pound continuously. The photographs made to this point are pedestrian at best, mediocre at worst. Not much to be proud of and time has started to run short.
One thing had changed from my first pass through: The women were starting to show some of their assets, often after much cheering persuasion from the men and women around them. The alcohol was also starting to fly – literally.
One woman bared herself three times, that I counted, from atop the shoulders of a willing helper, basking in the fleeting glory of the crowd each time. Many within the crowd captured the moment for eternity on cell-phone and regular cameras. By her third showing I was pretty close to the action and able to take what I think was my best picture of the day.
But each time she, or one of the other women around, lifted the hood hurled beer cans landed nearby, their journey started from outside the immediate vicinity. The number and scale of cans tossed increased with each show.
When another woman reached the heights but did not partake in the public exhibitionism, the tossed cans had become a barrage. An incoming caught me in the left hand as I gripped a camera pressed to my face. Backing up, beer having spewed all around and over me, I tripped and fell down. Another hit my left shin as a couple guys helped me gain my feet. Both were open and partially empty and so did not do much damage. But it did scare me.
Now many of the people were taking cover, cowering under chairs, backpacks and lids to storage containers. Others were countering the assault, firing off opened and empty cans. Foam was spewing everywhere as water bottles and other items were thrown in for flavor. Now the situation had deteriorated greatly. Getting out was becoming a viable option. But I was also thinking to myself what idiots these people were. But I decided to stay and photograph those withstanding the mostly aluminum and suds barrage.
Of course while trying to take cover some of the crowd tried to mug for the camera. Nothing better than hiding under a plastic cooler looking like an idiot as opened beer cans fall all around like large hail with flowing tails.
Later as I turned around and crouched to get a low angle of the situation, a drunk poured most of a beer on my back. Just great. Now I’m soaked, and most likely I’ll be ripe right around race time.
Finally a little sanity prevailed and the volley subsided. A security presence was established and at least one person hauled away. But in all my years, in college and after, in protests and hurricanes, I have never been involved with something so stupid and dangerous.
Now, after realizing I needed to get back and make deadline, I take one more pass by the portables. There I finally see heretofore unimaginable. A grown man running atop the plastic-shelled toilets, slipping and sliding and falling, with those below chucking, at nearly point-black range, salvo after salvo of beer cans at the hapless chap as he made his mad dash.
Pure insanity.
The second installment, covering the race and the rest of the day, will be posted Monday.
“And now” to quote the great Elmer Fudd, “for some west and wewaxation…”
Continue reading "Preakness Peek, Part 1" »
When the article appeared in the paper, much later than when I made the photographs, another was used as lead. The shoelace-as-floss boy was another cute picture, though more unusual, was one I liked also. But it never occurred to me it should be lead.
