It's nice in the evening, but a little chillier. There is probably no better place to eat lunch in the Commonwealth, and precious few places to match it for dinner either. Derby Week is the most difficult time for dining all year because everyone wants to go out. Not only are there thousands of visitors, but everybody else in town is in a holiday mood. The city's best places book up weeks or months in advance, and most other places of note feature the sort of wait you can expect at Joe's Stone Crab in Miami Beach.
Cancellations are the wild card in Derby eating.
Some diners make several reservations and then decide late which one they'll honor, resulting in empty tables. And many of the city's better places don't book themselves solid as a matter of policy or principle. According to Mark Aarvig, the Bristol's operations manager, the downtown Bristol is the easiest of the lot to get into. You'll wait, but it will be worth it. I doubt that many people come to Louisville to eat Asian food, which is exactly the point.