Everyone has a favorite Harvey Pack story. Mine involves two classic racetrack characters. One was Danny Lavezzo, the onetime proprietor of P.J. Clarke’s, the legendary New York saloon where Frank Sinatra himself had a regular table. The other was a guy named Clark Silber, who had a legendary gambling problem. As Harvey wrote in “May the Horse Be with You:” “Clark lost everything. He lost his home, his wife kicked him out, he was living in a furnished room near Aqueduct. It’s a tradition at the racetrack that when you see people, you say, ‘How are you doing?’ meaning, ‘How is your betting going?’ I asked Clark how he was doing one day, and he said to me, ‘I think I’m about even.’ ” How’s that for a window into the mind-set of certain horseplayers? He lost everything, but he thought he was even. One day, Clark was looking to borrow money, and he found Danny, who was on a poor streak himself but was a soft touch. Danny told him that he didn’t have any money at the moment, but he was good to lend if he hit his bet in the nightcap, and he showed Clark his ticket. Sure enough, Danny’s bet came in, and it was only then that he realized what he’d done. When he met Harvey back at the car, he explained: “You know how bad I’m going? I hit that race, so I had to lend Clark the money, and now I’ll never see it again. Even when I win, I lose.” It was my great pleasure to sit down with Harvey at the start of the summer and go back to the well. We collected several handfuls of his old racetrack and broadcasting stories in a series of videos that have been running for the past six weeks at DRF.com. There are many old chestnuts in here, including a few that Harvey has vowed to retire, Jerry Seinfeld style. In many ways, Seinfeld is an apt comparison for Harvey’s work over the years. He is our sport’s observational comic, noticing things that happen every day and presenting them in a way we’ve never thought about before. That, and they’ve both spent a lot of time rooting on the Mets from Manhattan’s Upper West Side. For those who don’t know, Harvey was a broadcasting force in racing. In one early job, he recreated race calls on WNBC radio in New York (the only way you could know the result if you weren’t at the track). For many years, he hosted the nationally syndicated race-recap show on SportsChannel, which is how many owners and breeders were able to see their horses run around the country. He was also part of the initial NBC broadcasts of the Breeders’ Cup. My first paying gig in horse racing was sitting on the side of the stage with Harvey at Siro’s back in the day and pointing at him when it was time to speak. I joke around that I took that job because it was easier to explain to my girlfriend (now wife) that I was moving to Saratoga for the summer to work on a TV show than to admit I was headed up there to bet horses every day. But that quip sells the experience I had short. I learned so much from Harvey in those few summers. He didn’t give out picks, but there was much to be gleaned from him about handicapping, the way he’d underline certain points the guests would make. It was also a master class in broadcasting. He always knew when to talk and when to listen, when to turn the conversation forward, and when to pause to let the panel fight it out. Two years ago, when I was asked by NYRA and DRF to host seminars ontrack on Saturdays before the races, the first call I made was to Harvey to ask for his blessing. His response? “You’re dead to me.” That was his inimitable way of telling me I was good to go. One thing I always wondered about Harvey was why he chose to work in racing instead of pursuing one of the other creative avenues for which he was suited. I believe he could have been a successful actor, comic, screenwriter, or critic. One afternoon over lunch, I asked him if he had any regrets about his career choices. He paused a second before answering, “I wouldn’t have been able to get to the track every day, and anyway, I didn’t want to work that hard.” It’s a good thing for racing that he didn’t.