Some might say I'm crazy...

Everybody has their quirks, the bits that make them unique and maybe a little weird. But in a world with billions of people, somebody has to have similar peculiarities, right? Just nod your head yes.

Well one of the joys of being me is loving to do ridiculous amounts of research no matter the time, place or necessity. If I don't know something or I can't remember...I'm finding out. It's probably not a shock that I loved watching Jeopardy and playing Trivial Pursuit as a kid. Knowledge fascinates me. The way things work.

Although I don't tend to watch a lot of TV, when I do I'm a massive sucker for any show that gives me behind-the-scenes or inner workings type info. If there's a factory involved, I'm watching. If I get to see how things work, I'm there for it.

One of my favorites is The Food that Built America series on the History channel (example, I just looked up the name of the show to make sure I got it right). I also love the 'Mighty' whatever series. There's Mighty Planes, Mighty Cruise Ships, Mighty Trains, etc. You get to see how these massive operations function every day. Anyway, I'm off on a tangent, but you get the point :)

I love to learn new things and could have been a perpetual student that never graduated simply to keep taking classes. I have audited some over the years and quite enjoyed the experience. MasterClass is also a source of great advice, information and teaching through video form, which added a wonderfully personal feel to the lessons.

Recently, I was working on a piece for Vocal's Microfiction Magic challenge, and the lovely Gina C and I were exchanging prompts for fun. We decided on a few settings to challenge ourselves. One in particular she gave me was the Kentucky Derby.

Now, I've heard about that particular horse race before and watched it on a number of occasions, but I don't follow the sport much more than the Triple Crown races. I figured I'd better start brushing up on my horse racing knowledge.

Soooo, I fell down an epic rabbit hole. I had so many tabs open on my computer I thought it may crash. I started with the history of the Derby itself and how it came to be. I always like to look at several sources so I can get a clear and hopefully unbiased picture of whatever I'm researching, so I joyfully worked my way from the 1800's forward.

I wanted to know who was winning, how to become a jockey, what exactly happens on race day, what the track looks like, do jockeys talk to their mounts, how do they signal a race to begin, what time of day are the races held, and what type of horses are used as compared to other races. I watched old footage of previous races, interviews with owners and jockeys. I checked into scandals, discrimination cases, illegal maneuvers and drugging. I looked into breeding and all the descendants of the major winners to see if they had offspring that also won.

I became obsessed with terminology. What do you call each part of the track, the uniforms, the gear used, parts of a starting gate, the different terms to refer to the Kentucky Derby itself, and on and on. I looked at countless photos of every one of those things too. I wanted a complete picture before I finished the story.

And the final topic I investigated was the lack of female representation both for the jockey and the Thoroughbred (like right there, I just checked to see if Thoroughbred needed capitalized in this case and if they were the only breed able to run in the Triple Crown. I was pretty sure on both counts, but wanted to be undoubtedly sure).

I had so much fun with this project and loved learning a bit about the horse racing world. I don't know if that makes me a nutter or not, but too bad. If you'd like to see how all this research played out in a story that was exactly one hundred words, I've included the link.

I'm not sure if this was a worthwhile read, but if you can identify in any way with my love of research or want to share your own unique thing, leave me a comment below. I'd love to hear what makes you tick.

P.S. If you'd like to know a hidden fact about this story, I chose the most recent filly (of the three total in history) that won the Kentucky Derby, Winning Colors, to feature because most of her progeny that went on to race had color-associated names. I wrote a poem awhile back called Colors of Silence and thought it would be cool to call my filly in the story by that name to sort of match.