S8E10: Hold all presents: a holiday with Collmus, Allen, Nelson

The Ron Flatter Racing Pod

The eighth annual holiday episode of the Ron Flatter Racing Pod celebrates Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa and even Festivus with three racetrack announcers.

Larry Collmus, the longtime voice of the Triple Crown and Breeders’ Cup on NBC, checks in on the heels of his assignment as the autumn announcer at Del Mar as well as his year-round appearances as a racing analyst on FanDuel TV.

Paul Allen not only discusses his work at Canterbury Park but also some of his experiences as the play-by-play voice of the Minnesota Vikings, a job that won him praise as a “national treasure” from none other than LeBron James.

Keith Nelson is familiar to racing fans in the Midwest as the caller at FanDuel Sportsbook and Racing, the track formerly known as Fairmount Park. He talks about his coming up as an announcer and the decades he has known host Ron Flatter going back to their early days in the ’70s in Northern California radio.

The stories run the gamut from best calls to strangest announcing experiences and even to favorite movies from which they often recite familiar dialog.

John Cherwa of the Los Angeles Times offers his perspective on the holiday season, comparing odd tales of what they have witnessed in all their years and miles of flying on commercial airlines.

The Ron Flatter Racing Pod via Horse Racing Nation is available via free subscription from Apple, Firefox, iHeart and Spotify as well as HorseRacingNation.com.