Off to the races

“Off to the races” is an expression used to characterize the activity at the beginning of something interesting or exciting. In the episode, we mentioned that there was a virus “super-spreader” that traveled to Italy and gave the virus to 43 people there. From that point, the virus was “off to the races” in Italy, or just at its beginning. You could say that once the cruise ship departed the dock, the tourists were “off to the races” for the week.