Ron Ambrose

[km]

Ron Ambrose RIP

I know some of you knew him. Others respected him - some did not. But he had an impact on tech handicapping for sure. He died of cancer recently.

[DanG]

Ron Ambrose RIP

I know some of you knew him. Others respected him - some did not. But he had an impact on tech handicapping for sure. He died of cancer recently.
Place me in the respectful column.

I did not know Ron personally, but we had several mutual friends. My accounts of him are all on that basis.

The man obviously wrestled with his demons but who among us hasn’t? Ron was widely respected when I lived in Vegas and his last few years were sad indeed.

Ron coined the term that I heard a thousand times in town. The “shaker bet” was the amount you could wager before your hand started shaking. He had tremendous discipline at the windows, but when he fired he took a bold stance.

R.I.P and all the best to his family.

[Ron Tiller]

I'll bet very few people know that had there been no Ron Ambrose, there would have been no HTR.

Ron opened the Handicapper's Institute in Las Vegas after leaving Los Angeles. Ron wanted to make the Institute a handicapper's think tank. He recruited Tom Hambleton to move to Las Vegas to be a part of the Institute. Jim Cramer went to one of Ron's seminars, took issue with almost everything he said, and kind of by osmosis, got a place to work on RsPos research at the Institute. I showed up en route back to Albuquerque, never made it back, and kind of by osmosis, got a place to work at the Institute with Jim. John Maroni, developer of Multicaps, was a paid employee - Ron's programmer. Jim and I and a half dozen people that congregated there daily just kind of showed up - none of us worked for Ron but he provided what can only be described as something akin to a 17th century french handicapping parlour. In a business/hobby/avocation such as handicapping, a noriously solitary endeavor, this is no small accomplishment. Those were good days.

Ron left for Remington Park one day to do a seminar and never showed his face at the Institute again, leaving what I will charitably call numerous financial issues hanging. We made an effort to track him down, but he simply disappeared. He later surfaced at Loughlin Nv, still betting horses.

Jim and I wanted to continue the projects we were working on so we set up shop elsewhere. Shortly afterwards, we started providing data to Cynthia Publishing's All In One, having met Dick Mitchell through Ron Amrose. Dick brokered a deal between Tom Brohammer, Ken and HDW to provide data files for the then fledgling MPH program. And the rest is history. It seems like yesterday. And many of you were there at the beginning. It all started in a nondescript office complex on Flamingo road, at a place called the Handicapper's Institute, conceived and operated by a man named Ron Ambrose.

So now both Dick and Ron are gone, and with them, a significant part of our personal history and a significant part of handicapping history.

Ron Tiller
HDW

[Donnie]

WOW!! I never knew......thanks for the cool story Ron! Didn't realize Mitchell was part of the true birth of HTR. Always admired the guy....now even moreso!

[DanG]

Ditto Donnie;

Ron,

I realize the market doesn’t warrant writing horse racing books but your personal accounts would make a great read.

Thanks for sharing that very personal and interesting background.

[njcurveball]

Ditto at least a few times!

It is nice to know about the Icons that came before us.

Thanks for the story Ron!!!

[Cole]

Very interesting Ron--nice story.

[dehere]

Ron, that was great! Thanks a lot. I saw this thread expanding and, having never known Ron Ambrose or anything about him figured it probably didn't include anything of interest. But, gee, you never know.

Ron, Ken, Rick, others - you gotta take notes and keep them filed away somewhere. There will be a book one day, its value enhanced by a series of major contest (and pick 6) winners who attributed their success to this great piece of software. Just make sure you can remember these sorts of details so everyone can enjoy this piece of horserace handicapping history.

[Huguenot]

Ron,
I was at the old HDW office one day in the mid-90s with the late Michael Perry while I was working on the Thorovision manual with Mike Showalter. Was that the same Handicappers Institute office?