Where did the Arlington Park regulars go? Many ended up at a Prospect Heights OTB

Casual horse racing fans watching Saturday's Kentucky Derby might download a phone app to bet on the nation's marquee race while they watch the nationally televised broadcast. A few others may stop into their local off-track betting parlor to lay down a wager.

But for a group of local horseplayers, the back patio at a Prospect Heights sports bar/OTB has become their regular meeting spot since the closure of Arlington Park in 2021. It's where they still get together to play the ponies, share memories, and debate all that went wrong and what could have happened differently to keep their favorite racetrack open.

"I wouldn't know these guys without Arlington Park," said Mark Marcanio, of Carpentersville, who started going to the now-shuttered Arlington Heights track in high school. "That was our 'Cheers.'"

Nearly every race day when Arlington was open, at least a few regulars would hold down a set of tables and chairs on the grandstand's west side patio. On weekends, the self-proclaimed group of "west enders" could number 100, they say.

Even on a recent Saturday in April, the revolving door of friends - and friends of friends - who showed up to Players Pub & Grill grew as the afternoon went on.

"This is like a family, and it's a shame when they took it away," said Dana Kollmeyer of Palatine.

Since the final race at the storied local oval - and subsequent closure of its Trackside OTB at Euclid Avenue and New Wilke Road - the Prospect Heights OTB has seen about a 30% increase in weekend business, according to bar general manager Vanessa Henderson.

Operating under a partnership with Hawthorne Race Course since 2013, the OTB at the corner of River Road and Milwaukee Avenue has become the second-busiest parlor in the state, with more than $22 million wagered there in 2022, according to the Illinois Racing Board's annual report. That's second only to the OTB in Oakbrook Terrace, which saw nearly $26 million in handle last year.

With a capacity of 270 indoors and 140 across three outdoor patios, the Players bar staff is expecting a capacity crowd for this weekend's Derby. City officials require they provide valet parking on Derby weekend because of the added congestion.

The group of Arlington Park expats will be among the fans there to cheer on Two Phil's, the colt trained by North Barrington's Larry Rivelli that has 12-1 morning line odds in the Run for the Roses.

The scene on the bar's back patio is similar in many ways to what they had at Arlington: tables filled with buckets of beer, betting tickets and copies of the Daily Racing Forum; cigar smoking, conversation and camaraderie.

Only now the live racing is relegated to two TV screens - most always tuned to Keeneland, the track in Lexington, Kentucky. (The bar staff gives them a remote to change channels.)

Many are content to watch horse racing here, but some plan regular trips to the famous tracks still around: Saratoga, Oaklawn and Gulfstream, among others.

"I like to look at a horse before I bet on it," said Mary Bridges of Skokie. "I would go every day in the summer (to Arlington)."

But day-to-day, many of these Northwest suburbanites say they don't go out of their way to see races at Hawthorne, the lone Chicago-area track, in Stickney. It's too far, and it's no Arlington, they contend.

They reserve much of their scorn for Churchill Downs Inc., the corporate owner of the namesake track where the Derby is being held Saturday. After shutting down Arlington in 2021, the company sold the 326-acre property to the Chicago Bears earlier this year for $197.2 million.

"You couldn't pay me to go there," Mike Benson of Arlington Heights says of the storied Louisville track. "I haven't gone to the Derby in 15 years."

After state gambling expansion legislation was approved in 2019, Churchill declined to add slots and table games to Arlington - long seen as a lifeline to the struggling horse racing industry. Many in the group said they were disappointed, but not surprised, since Churchill had acquired a 61% stake in nearby Rivers Casino in Des Plaines.

"It didn't have to happen," said Jim Thompson, of Arlington Heights, whose dad was a village trustee in the 1960s and 1970s.

But even before this week's announcement that the Bears plan to begin demolition on the stately six-story grandstand, some in the group of west enders seemed resigned to the fact that Arlington Park wouldn't reopen for live racing.

"Life changes and you gotta change with it," Thompson said. "This place is the only option we've got."