DerbyWars $25K Final Four Player Profile - Mike Martin

The Final Four face off in DerbyWars' $25,000 Head-to-Head February Bracket Championship Saturday, with the Final round on Sunday. The Four players who advanced this far have won 4 matchups in a row, against some tough competiton and with some challenging races. Here's the first player profile!

Mike Martin of Norwood, Ohio just jumped into contest play in June of 2014 and quickly won his way up the leaderboard.

"My business partner, Ryan Patterson, was persistently a pest about how I should start playing," said Martin. "I agreed to give it a shot and qualified for this year's NHC on my first try about a week later; from there I just stuck with it practicing to get a little better."

 

The twenty-three year old is no stranger to horse racing, getting first-hand experience with betting and horse ownership through his father.

"I have been handicapping races from about the time I could count from 1A to 12," he said. "I spent summer days at River Downs and cold nights at Turfway with my dad for as long as I can remember. My father sort of dabbled in horse ownership on and off as I was growing up, mostly as a hobby, where I gained an appreciation for all of the work that goes into making the races happen. Seeing that at an early age helped my handicapping skills tremendously over the years. All of that helped me to get off to a fast start playing these contests, because I went into it with absolutely no sense of actual contest strategy and somehow wasn't eaten alive by the whole thing."

Martin was a quick study, and in the Sweet Sixteen and Elite Eight rounds, he defeated two DerbyWars $100K winners - Tony Kite (Akiteflier) and Barbara Bowley (Sophia)!

"Head-to-Head is so different from a regular day at the races, because you play your singular opponent and that's all that matters," he said. "That is tough to grasp, after all I'm still learning here!"

 

• See All The Head-to-Head Champions 

Martin plays under the handle "Actioncatxmike" - a name with much significance.

"After my father passed away a few years ago, I started Team Actioncat to fulfill a mutual dream of ours to be more involved in the racing industry. The "Actioncats" was our father/son bowling team from when I was a little kid, so I thought it would be fitting name for the operation," he said. "Since the start a little over a year ago, I've been involved in a little bit of everything from overseeing a small but mighty stable split between Kentucky and Florida to pinhooking at auction with my partner, Brad Auger."

And if he goes 6-for-6 and takes down the $10,000 First Prize?

"If I won I'd probably invest a lot of it into the business. Maybe try to start a new partnership up for the spring/summer racing. It's a major goal of mine to be personable and get casual fans involved in the industry in a more intimate and innovative way."

Martin plays Tony Brice (Lonestar609), 2014 NHC runner-up in the Final Four round on Saturday - but judging by his previous weeks' play against veterans, Brice is the one who should be sweating!