Travelling Stateside - The trainer's perspective
By Alex Cairns
In recent years, international travel has become much more accessible and people now regularly embark on journeys previously the reserve of a few trail-blazing adventurers. The same is true for racehorses, whose handlers can today chart careers based on a rich international programme that offers opportunities year-round. For European trainers, America is perhaps the most readily accessible intercontinental option, with fewer regulations to be negotiated than in Asia or Australia. The relatively reduced distance from Europe to the US also provides an incentive, especially if running in the east of the country.
Ed Dunlop has been travelling horses to some of the world’s far-flung reaches for almost 20 years now and has consistently demonstrated his ability to get it right thanks to the success of horses such as Lailani, Ouija Board, Snow Fairy, and Red Cadeaux.
WHY AMERICA?
Ed Dunlop’s experience of running Lailani in the US in 2001 benefitted his subsequent runners.
There are lucrative and prestigious opportunities for all types of horses in America, notably in the Breeders’ Cup or the Fall Meet at Keeneland in Kentucky. Dunlop may have been steeped in racing from his earliest age thanks to the exploits of his now sadly departed father John, but sending horses to the US was a learning curve nonetheless. “One of my earliest experiences and successes in America was with a filly called Lailani. She won the Irish Oaks in July 2001 before we sent her to Belmont in New York for the Grade 1 Flower Bowl Stakes in September of the same year. She won that too, but then ran badly in the Breeders’ Cup Fillies and Mares, again at Belmont. I learnt a lot from her actually because we left her there after the Flower Bowl and I think that affected her performance. This helped us adapt our approach with Ouija Board, who provided us with some our biggest days in America, winning two Breeders’ Cup Fillies and Mares in 2004 and 2005.”
In 2001, a trip to the east coast of America still represented a serious logistical challenge and financial outlay for European runners, so one can understand Dunlop’s decision not to ship Lailani home between runs. Today, however, advances in transport and reductions in cost make flying visits a viable option. “If you look at someone like Aidan O’Brien, who is probably the most accomplished trainer in the world these days when it comes to travelling horses, he flies them in and out as if they were just travelling to the races down the road in a horsebox. That seems to be the best approach, though isn’t always possible depending on the destination.”
PREPARATIONS
Ouija Board, a dual winner and runner-up in the Filly & Mare Turf in three visits to the Breeders’ Cup.
So scaling up the same practices employed for running a horse a few miles down the road can be a winning formula, but any international campaign will nonetheless require a certain amount of preparation and planning. How should a horse be prepared for international travel? And how might running in the US compare to Asia or Australia? “Travelling horses to America tends to be a lot more simple, as there aren’t lengthy quarantines to be negotiated for us on the UK end. When we send horses to America they are travelled fit, put in the barn and kept there apart from for exercise. Then they run and come home soon after. From our experience, travelling to Australia or Japan is a lot more complicated, as both countries have very tough rules and normally around a month in quarantine is required. These regulations also affect what you can take feed-wise, so that has to be taken into account.”
Sheer geography can also have a strong influence on where might be best for European trainers to launch an international campaign. “Travelling from the UK to America is not such a huge distance, if we’re talking about the east coast anyway, so that makes it all the easier. The further you fly a horse then the greater the cost, the more susceptible they are to travel sickness, and the more chance there is of incident along the way.”
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Michael Dickinson - "The Mad Genius"
Michael Dickinson is welcoming and instantly likeable, suffused with energy as he bounces around Tapeta Farm on the Chesapeake Bay in North East, Maryland. “I don’t say I’m good or great but I’m not boring”, he promises. Along that vein, the burning question is, why do people call him “The Mad Genius”, as coined by an American turf writer?
Frances J Karon (European Trainer - issue 23 - Autumn 2008)
Johnny Jones - we profile the legendary Kentucky horseman
When John T.L. Jones Jr. props his cowboy boots up on his desk, he leaves behind the mud accumulated from 72 years of being the Jones to keep up with. Unlike the speedy Quarter Horses that jump-started his livelihood by making a mad dash to the finish line, Jones’ ascent in the racing industry has taken him several circuits around the racecourse.
Frances Karon (European Trainer - issue 16 - Winter 2006)
When John T.L. Jones Jr. props his cowboy boots up on his desk, he leaves behind the mud accumulated from 72 years of being the Jones to keep up with. Unlike the speedy Quarter Horses that jump-started his livelihood by making a mad dash to the finish line, Jones’ ascent in the racing industry has taken him several circuits around the racecourse.
Jones spent nearly 30 years at the helm of Walmac International, presiding over the successful stallion careers of dual Arc winner Alleged and the great sire Nureyev before selling the farm to his son Johnny III and business partner Bobby Trussell. Retirement was short-lived as Jones soon fell back on his roots to train a small string of horses. In between running a couple of two-year-olds at the fall meet at Keeneland, he took some time to sit down and think back on his years in the business.
When you sold Walmac in 2004, you could have chosen to do anything, or nothing for that matter. What influenced your decision to train again?
My good friend R.D. Hubbard said to go buy some yearlings and I wanted to supervise them through at least their first year to know kind of what I got. I haven’t really supervised that kind of thing for 35 years. But I enjoy it. I guess I just have an addiction to horses. I like them! To be honest with you I don’t know how long I’m going to train.
Your father was in the insurance business. Did he want you to follow in his footsteps?
Not particularly. We’d had horses since I was a boy, I mean, as far back as I can remember. He got interested in Quarter Horses and registered his first horse in 1945, so I just grew up with it. He was a businessman, but still we always had a farm and had horses and so I had an interest. Then when I went to college, I played golf and got away a little bit from the horses because I was gone all the time. When my dad passed away in 1958 he had probably 25 or 30 head of Quarter Horses. So basically I started devoting all my time to horses right after my father died.
So how does one begin the journey from humble origins with Quarter Horses in Quanah, Texas to syndicate manager for some of the world’s most valuable Thoroughbred stallions?
I ended up joint venturing a deal on my farm in 1965 and when my partner got into a financial bind that carried me with him I lost everything I had. When you wake up one day with four children and no money, you’d better get your ass to work. I went to the track and started training for Walter Merrick in 1966.
Had you had any introduction, formal or otherwise, to training?
No.
So from the first day you started training horses you just went on instinct?
Well, Mr. Merrick was a legendary horseman but he never had much input. What he basically told me is that little things win races. In other words, that everybody knows to feed them, everybody knows to gallop them, everybody knows to work them, the details are what make the difference between the people that win and the others. Most of what I learned was trial and error. So I won races all the time, everywhere I went. First started off with match racing, and we won most of them.
Where was that, at bush league tracks?
You’d pull up in a trailer and a guy would say, what have you got and how far do you want to go? You’d bet $500 or $1000. I started doing that every weekend instead of playing golf.
I got into it because a cowboy was badgering me one time so I went down by the wheat field and grated off about 3/8’s of a mile, just turned around and let the horse run. We got to hauling down there to those little old straightaway tracks. Most of them were bred to run; well the horse I started out with was out of a half-Thoroughbred mare. Originally he was meant to be a parade horse for a friend of mine’s boy. That was in 1962 or ’63, first time that he’d ever been on an official – by that I mean pari-mutuel – track. His name was Gold Nugget Sims. The first time I’d ever been to an official track and he ran second and I was thrilled. I went and got them to give me a picture of him being second.
It was about a $300 purse. I was in the paddock that night and it was hotter than Hades up in Oklahoma, 240 miles from where I lived. So I was in the paddock and I was nervous and I’d never been in a paddock before like that. The paddock judge came out and said, “Rain’s over!” I said, huh? It was so hot and not a cloud in the sky... He said, “Reins over!” and I went oh! and threw the reins over the horse’s head.
I think you’ve learned a lot since then!
I’ve learned most of it by trial and error. Still making errors!
At this point your main focus was on Quarter Horses. Did you win any major races?
The biggest Quarter Horse race I won was the Kansas Futurity in 1967 with Jet Smooth for Mr. Merrick. I did train some cheaper, New Mexico Thoroughbreds for him, too.
How and when did you transition to Thoroughbreds?
I went to work for a fellow named Marvin Warner in Cincinnati. He gave me the freedom and the financial backing to do what I thought was the best in the horse business. In 10 years he never bought a horse and he never sold a horse. Now, had I not been producing, had I not been making money, I’d have been back in Texas chopping cotton. But he enabled me to accomplish something or use my knowledge to accomplish something where 99% of owners like that that don’t know anything about the business start thinking they know and it’s all an odds game anyway. He enjoyed the game, he enjoyed going to the races and never injected what he thought about the horses. I had pretty much a free rein and we were fortunate enough to do well. It just gives you an edge, it just gives you the advantage of over a period of time being right more times than you’re wrong. ‘Cause in the horse business you’re going to be wrong a lot of times. So, that’s really where I was lucky with Mr. Warner because he just gave me a free rein. He looked at the balance sheet and as long as that was good he allowed me to go to Europe, he allowed me to go anywhere I wanted to go. Not many people have that opportunity.
Training horses at River Downs in Ohio in the late 1970’s, you were in a good spot to observe the fledgling career of Steve Cauthen.
[Steve’s father] Tex was our horseshoer. I wasn’t paying much attention and I’d already made a deal with a jock at River Downs to ride our horses when Steve started riding and I couldn’t really get out of that commitment because I wanted to do what I’d said I’d do. I rode Steve some when he first started out. But then when he went to New York we’d sent horses to Chuck Taliaferro [for Marvin Warner] and since his family knew Chuck – we were all kind of family – well Steve went up and stayed with Chuck when he got really rolling.
Why did you leave training?
I figured out if I was ever going to be a factor in the industry it was going to be through stallions but I didn’t have any money; I had to get into something where I could use other people’s money. A man told me a long time ago that in the stallion business, people are calling you – you’re not having to call them. In other words, you can gather a lot of information in all facets of the industry by just picking people’s brain when they call asking about a stallion or something. I knew where I wanted to be but I didn’t know exactly how to get there. I thought with some of the older, established farms, I thought at that time there was a little spot for a younger farm. Brereton Jones had just got started and most of the other farms around here had just one stallion, except for Claiborne, Spendthrift and Gainesway. In all honesty, I’ve known a lot of people in my life that worked very hard and were good horsemen but never did have the break.
What is the most difficult part of being a trainer?
Training horses is somewhat of a mundane life. In other words, as Walter Merrick taught me, the little things win races. For example, there will be a few seconds, a few minutes of highs…the majority of what a trainer goes through are negatives. He’s got a horse that’s coming up a little off, or not doing what he expects of him, or enters it in a race but only one horse can win.
That’s probably less true of trainers at the top level with a barn full of stakes-quality horses. There is quite a dichotomy between the Todd Pletchers and everyone else.
For some of these fellows it’s somewhat of a system to run a business rather than training and teaching the individual horse. The horse adapts to a system and if he doesn’t they really don’t have time for him, especially when they’ve got horses at five different locations. That’s also different from the way I came up. Thirty, forty horses was the most anybody had. Most owners had their own personal trainer; the Whitneys had their trainer, Spendthrift had their trainer, Claiborne had their trainer. Very few have that now; they’ve either got their horses scattered or they’ve got them in a huge stable with somebody.
We’re talking about a very small minority of the trainers. But even in Europe, I think, most of the bigger stables are still geared towards the personal aspect and trainers are able to feel their horses’ legs every night and know about every little niggling problem as it happens.
With major trainers in America today, probably a lot of them know exactly what is going on but they have to hear it from somebody else. Their system is excellent, but the owners don’t have the personal touch. It used to be a much more social atmosphere, a personal atmosphere rather than all business. They have a very, very good system but they can’t possibly be as involved like the trainers of the old days. You used to see pictures of old Sunny Jim Fitzsimmons sitting on a stool running cold water on a horse’s legs. You don’t see much of that with your high-profile trainers anymore.
Sure you do, right after their horse has won the Kentucky Derby! But that makes for a great photo op.
That’s it.
What differences have you noticed between the horse of today and his ancestors?
The horses are much more fragile than they were 30 years ago. Horses that had stamina were more acceptable in American racing until the advent of the two-year-old sales. A huge part of our market is to pinhook into the two-year-old sales so that requires speed. With so many buyers looking for speed people are breeding for it. The faster horses run the more liable they are to break down so I think that probably we’re breeding less sound horses. Not many people want to buy a horse and wait for him to make his first start at three; they want it now.
Of course I have to ask, what do you think of the Polytrack?
Polytrack, well, nobody knows for sure but I do know one thing, it’s much easier on horses. I think it will probably in a number of years have an effect on how we breed horses. They say that grass horses like the Polytrack. I think to a certain extent – obviously there’s no absolute to this business – I do think it will give horses with stamina more opportunities and it’s safer for the horses. Everybody likes it. I give Rogers Beasley a lot of credit for pushing them [to install the Polytrack at Keeneland]. First of all, it’s safer. It’s just safer. Plus, you don’t have the days when your racetrack’s a soupy mess.
Is there anything you don’t like about artificial surfaces?
One thing I do think is that all the tracks going to that surface should use the same material. Not with any prejudices to any manufacturer but just to make everything the same. I haven’t experienced any of the others so I can’t say accurately but I would say it would have been better if they had been all the same. And they may be all so similar that it doesn’t make any difference.
And its overall effect?
It’s much easier on a horse. A horse has got to be a little fitter, there’s going to be a little more emphasis on recognizing stamina in pedigrees. Five furlong horses that could go 6 furlongs or even a mile and a sixteenth are not going to do that on these surfaces. I think you’ll see horses lasting longer, I think you’ll see fuller fields. Fuller fields mean more pari-mutuel wagering so I think it’s all positive. If horses last longer owners have more chances to recoup money and to make money and it’s positive all the way down the line.
Another positive of the artificial surfaces is that horses are getting a hold of it leaving the gate. I think a lot of horses hurt themselves when they stumble or the ground breaks out from under them leaving the gate, bam! and they’re hitting it wrong and then they run around there and break down. I just think a lot of injuries are caused at the starting gate and with the new surfaces they get a hold of it, they don’t slip, and they go.
The recent Welfare and Safety of the Racehorse Summit held at Keeneland included a presentation made by Wayne McIlwraith, D.V.M., in which he said that most breakdowns are due to pre-existing stress fractures or other such conditions. Would you like to see routine MRIs, CT scans and ultrasounds become mandatory?
I guess you could regulate yourself clear out of business.
But if you’re saving your horse you’re keeping yourself in business.
Well but it’s going to come down to an opinion. It’s just like the vets vetting these horses that have a little chip here or a stress fracture or something that they’re not particularly sore on, but it’s there. One vet says don’t run it, the next vet says it’s okay to run. If you want to just have a nightmare, try to do something like that.
What is your stance on the ever-controversial drug and medication policy in the U.S.?
Overall I think racing is good. I think we’ve gone overboard in not allowing some analgesic-type drugs to be used on horses. I imagine the people who are saying that horses should run on oats and hay are taking eight pills a day for themselves to get through the day. I don’t think it’s fair; analgesics are just comfort-type drugs. They’re athletes, just like baseball players or football players, and narcotics and steroids are not good but I think drugs like Lasix and Banamine and stuff like that are fine. It’s like someone getting up in the morning and taking an Advil for their headache. I don’t think they’ll ever solve the problem. We’ve got too many jurisdictions and everybody wants to be the hero. By the time they figure out what one guy’s using he’s going to come up with another [drug], and it’s almost impossible; they may know something’s in a test but they can’t tell you what it is.
How would you deal with this issue?
There are two things that could probably stop a huge part of it. Number one, the jurisdiction should know what’s in the truck of a veterinarian pulling in on the backside. No point in having certain drugs in your truck, or they could have a dispensary for specific drugs that could be signed out. I also think – I know it’d be expensive – but if they think people are doing something illegal – they take your picture most anywhere now, anytime you go to the bank to cash a check you get your picture taken, or go to the convenience store, everybody’s getting their picture taken. So, if they really want to do something about it they should just put some monitors in the barn. Then they’ll know who’s in the barn at all times.
But you can’t see what they’re giving them.
If you know what’s in their truck, you’d know that they don’t have any business with certain drugs. I just think you’ve got to try to stay away from anything that is going to endanger a horse’s health but analgesic medications, I don’t see anything wrong with that.
Let’s hear your thoughts on another sensitive subject, the horse slaughter ban bill awaiting Senate approval.
I think it is going to be a major problem in the logistics of it if they go ahead and pass this horse slaughter ban. There’s nobody that loves horses better than I love horses. And if I want to take care of my horse, turn him out and retire him and let him die of old age, that’s my business. If I want to support an organization that does that, that’s my business. I shouldn’t try to legislate what somebody else does with their property. Not just the Thoroughbred industry – there’s millions of horses. I don’t know what they think that they’re going to do with all of them because it’s just going to compound. That’d be like turning them out on the roadside only to get killed by people running over them. Which is worse, letting a horse go to slaughter or letting him starve to death? That has to do with the difference between being emotional and being realistic.
Either way, people are looking for absolution instead of taking responsibility. Slaughtering the horses just makes room for more and it creates a snowball effect. Stasis will only make things worse because people will feel encouraged to continue to breed as though there is no moral dilemma.
The government cannot take responsibility for what we do. We have to be responsible for our own morality and what we do with things. We can’t have the government telling us every move, whether it’s moral or immoral or what it is. I could argue both sides of the coin. It’s pretty silly to a certain extent to spend all that money they’re raising to save retired horses when the same guy walks down the backstretch and sees little kids in the tack rooms with no money and does very little for them.
John Gaines credited you with breaking down the dissension that threatened to keep the Breeders’ Cup from becoming a reality. Are you satisfied with how it has matured in these 23 years?
Give him credit, I thought Mr. Gaines was very innovative. And I think that once we got it organized and were able to appease the different factions, I think [the Breeders’ Cup has] been a tremendous success. If you went through the list of buyers at the Keeneland Summer Sale in like 1970, none of them were from Europe but I suspected that the game was going to get global in the early Seventies with global transportation and ease of getting horses over here. You could fly one over here from England about as quick as you can fly it to California – definitely faster than you can van it out there. So I thought it was going to be a global thing and I thought that it would put the spotlight on a special day, at least have another venue that the public could attach itself to rather than just the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont if you happen to have something that might win the Triple Crown.
What improvements would you suggest?
We probably need to take a step further, which I think we’re doing, by creating venues leading to the Breeders’ Cup. It could be a venue in England or Ireland or France or anywhere. I don’t think you can really create any public excitement without events. People always follow crowds. People aren’t going to NASCAR just to see cars running around, they’re waiting on a wreck and to people-watch. The biggest thing about the Derby is, number one, it’s the Derby. Number two, people go to people-watch 150,000 people. People like crowds.
You don’t think that these additional venues will detract from the Breeders’ Cup?
No no no. Not if you start soon enough, it’s just like football and baseball and basketball, they all have playoffs.
Do you think you have any Breeders’ Cup-caliber horses in your barn?
I’ve got two or three of them working like they’re nice horses. A Chester House colt looks like a good one, the same for a Holy Bull colt and a Cat Thief colt who rapped a tendon – it’s minor but I’m giving him some time – I think he might be a good colt. The rest of them I think might be just ordinary.
How many horses do you have in training?
We’ve got about fifteen, all 2-year-olds.
Did you buy any yearlings at the sales this year?
No, but I’ve got three I bred that will go into training.
You’ve had a winner from only a handful of starters, but it didn’t run in your name! How did that happen?
I wasn’t licensed in Ohio so I just let my assistant trainer Ricky Castilleja get his license and he was down as the trainer. I had a filly run third at Saratoga but I’d sent her to Patrick Biancone for the meet and I’ve since sent her to Mike Doyle at Woodbine because she’s a Canadian-bred. I don’t care whether it’s in my name or somebody else’s. I was in San Antonio all winter every day just about and then Keeneland in April, and went to Turfway after that. I’ve got an excellent assistant, and I talk to him twice a day.
Will you continue to train for the foreseeable future?
If I don’t have three or four nice horses by the end of Churchill I’ll probably send them to another trainer.
And then what? Play golf? Go to Barbados?
I’ll just spend more time at my ranch in Oklahoma. I like the cattle. I’ve enjoyed this and I have no complaints. It’s just that I’ve been doing it for forty-something years.
You can only get so far even by being in the right place at the right time, so how do you explain your success?
In a nutshell, I’ve been lucky. But I was paying attention.
Frank Stronach and his growing global Magna empire
When Frank Stronach says he is optimistic that “down the line” his company can control “ten per cent of all the gambling in the world”, the queue of punters wanting to bet against him may be very short. He has a record of reaching his targets, and if he ruffles a few feathers along the way, so what.
Howard Wright (European Trainer - issue 15 - Autumn 2006)
When Frank Stronach says he is optimistic that “down the line” his company can control “ten per cent of all the gambling in the world”, the queue of punters wanting to bet against him may be very short. He has a record of reaching his targets, and if he ruffles a few feathers along the way, so what.
Stronach reaches his 74th birthday in September, but he retains the energy and business enthusiasm that took him from his native Austria to Canada as a 21-year-old tool and machine engineer, and launched him into his own company three years later. At the age of 41 he was running a major automotive parts company, Magna International Inc., from which eventually sprung Magna Entertainment Corp. (MEC), now the biggest race-track owner and operator in the United States and the vehicle for his gambling ambitions.
In the States, MEC accounts for 11 racecourses, ranging from the glorious and historical Gulfstream Park, Pimlico and Santa Anita, through the unexpected Breeders’ Cup venue Lone Star Park, to the thoroughbred and quarter horse mix of Remington Park, and accompanying training centres.
Then there are two television channels, a betting operation, and a one-third share in AmTote, the leading international totalisator systems provider that will soon become wholly owned by MEC; a plant making horse bedding, and various extensive real estate developments.
The Magna empire was not always so big; it was bigger. With losses mounting, Stronach’s frantic purchase of race tracks in the late-1990s was balanced last year by the sale of two harness racing tracks, one in Canada, the other on the Maryland-Virginia axis.
In Europe, Stronach’s immediate influence is less obvious. Personally, the man who has a trophy room full of Eclipse Awards for owning and/or breeding such as the Preakness Stakes winner Red Bullet, Belmont Stakes winner Touch Gold, and Breeders’ Cup winners Awesome Again and his son Ghostzapper, Perfect Sting and Macho Uno, has only recently dipped a toe into the ownership waters, with horses in training with Luca Cumani and Jeremy Noseda that were collected when he bought for the first time at Tattersalls in Newmarket in 2005.
Corporately, European interests extend to the Magna Racino, a 24-hour combination of racecourse and casino 20 miles south of Vienna that is Stronach’s gift to his Austrian birthplace, a betting website, MagnaBet, and a one-third share in a joint venture with Churchill Downs and Racing UK, the British racecourse rights exploiter and TV channel operator.
That last project, set up earlier this year and operating from England as Racing World, is both new and still small, but it sets the tone – and may yet set the standard – for Magna’s global wagering ambitions. It brings together two great race-track rivals, covering most of the top venues in North America, a UK subscription-only racing channel that boasts the best of British racing, bar Ascot, and is pointed towards a European-based betting site, MagnaBet, which feeds all manner of foreign currency into the dollar-rich host-track pools.
Joe de Francis, Magna’s executive vice president and recently promoted to the main board, was at the forefront of negotiations to set up Racing World, and he is not immune to gentle ribbing about the amalgamation of ambitions between his company and Churchill Downs, which together provided most of the funding for the project.
“There’s an internet term known as co-opetition, which sums up our relationship,” he says. “We’re vigorous competitors in some areas but collaborators in others. Global distribution of the racing and betting product is the key, and it’s the smart and the right thing for us to work much more closely on an international vehicle such as Racing World. We both have quality content, and that goes for Racing UK, so this is an ideal arrangement.
“In addition, we have MagnaBet, the essentially German-language, European sister to XpressBet, our US-based, English-language internet betting site. They have developed side by side, but we are in the process of merging them on to one platform, which will be available globally, with technical expertise sitting in various places around the world.
“We need local partners, who understand the idiosyncrasies of the local markets. That’s why it’s important to be with Racing UK, which knows the demands of British punters.”
Magna previously worked for a time with the other UK racing channel, At The Races, through TRNi, but the relationship was never a marriage made in heaven, perhaps because TRNi’s vision clashed with Stronach’s.
The arrangement with Racing UK is working well, says executive chairman Simon Bazalgette, who explains: “I think they are much more comfortable working with a racecourse group that understands how a betting path should operate. They also seemed to be impressed how Racing UK was managing our racecourses’ right in the UK, because they wanted to exploit their rights in the UK and Ireland.
“Racing UK was already working with Magna because XpressBet was taking UK racing, but Racing World has strengthened our relationship, which will grow, especially now that we have 48-hour declarations in place in Britain.
“We are in the process of putting pari-mutuel links into the major UK bookmakers, which will transmit bets back to the US pools through the AmTote gateway.
“To distinguish themselves from the betting exchanges, and to help their margins, UK bookmakers are becoming more interested in the kind of exotic bets that overseas pari-mutuel operators provide. We see this as a growth area, especially when UK punters realise they can play the big carry-overs that US pools often turn up.”
Bazalgette, who expects the joint venture to take more UK racing to the States in the future, as the possible precursor to a fully global channel that would include other European racing authorities, sums up his joint venture partners: “Churchill Downs is the more corporate, more conservative organisation, but Magna is very driven and commercial, which reflects Frank Stronach’s business approach. He has shaken up North American racing, buying tracks when no-one else did.”
Magna will need to be commercial if it is to drive down ongoing losses and wipe out the minimum $500m of debts hanging round its neck. This year’s first-quarter net income of $2.2m was the first plus after seven consecutive losing quarters, but the second quarter reverted to recent type, and though revenues for the first six months of 2006 were up from $413m to $465m, compared with the same period in the previous year, costs were also up, largely due to servicing debt, from $433m to $488m. The red ink is back, and the second-quarter loss of around $26m all but matches the same period in 2005.
Yet Stronach remains confident. He believes MEC could be debt free, or have very little debt, some time next year. “People may ask, ‘Why the hell are you in this kind of business, losing so much money?’” he said to investors on publication of the first-quarter results. “Well, it’s a huge business, and I’m optimistic that down the road, we have a great opportunity to be the foremost gambling and entertainment company in the world.”
Joe de Francis, a lawyer by profession, has 25 years’ experience in the horseracing business. His family controlled the Maryland Jockey Club, which owns Laurel Park and Pimlico, home of the Preakness Stakes, and he took over as chief executive in August 1989. He retains that position today, but under Magna, which bought 51 per cent of the company from de Francis and his sister in November 2002.
De Francis is well placed to view all sides of the MEC operation. “I came in at the tail end of the cycle of acquiring race tracks and at the beginning of the distribution of the racing and betting products,” he reflects. “I believe Mr Stronach when he talks about controlling ten per cent of global gambling. You can’t climb high unless you aim high.
“Magna is both a race-track company and a wagering organisation. It believes strongly in vertical integration. First and foremost it owns race tracks, but to be successful in the 21st century you have to distribute your content as broadly as possible, and that’s where globalisation is important. It’s part of our mission statement.
“To be successful, a race-track operator has to be involved in distribution businesses. I compare horseracing to manufacturing. We make the product and we distribute it.
“Since I came into the business, I’ve watched the evolution in distribution, from the days when you got in your car and drove to the track to bet on live racing. There was no simulcasting, very little off-track betting and no home wagering, and it was only about a dozen years ago that things began to change.
“The challenges now are to select the best technology, distribution platforms and partners, so that you can take the product around the world. The challenges in North America, which centre on legislation, underscore the importance of developing systems to take the product to Europe, South America and the Pacific Rim.
“One advantage is that horseracing is extraordinarily popular, to varying degrees, around the world. The only comparison for passion and global appeal is football.”
De Francis stresses that nailing down the distribution systems will be key to Magna’s success, with three pathways to be negotiated, in no particular order but together.
“There’s the bet pathway,” he says. “Since our wagering is pari-mutuel, as opposed to fixed odds, we have to figure out the best way to transmit a bet from the customer to the race track, which is important because the pari-mutuel system allows the customer access to a range of betting opportunities, such as the exotics, that fixed odds cannot provide.
“We are exercising our option to purchase the remaining 70 per cent of equity in AmTote, and that will give us control over one of the best companies in the global market. We are working actively with a number of the larger UK bookmakers to allow them to take pari-mutuel bets on our racing, which will enable them to offer exotic bets.”
De Francis is aware of Simon Bazalgette’s observation that UK bookmakers could get one over the betting exchanges from this channel, but he takes no side over the new betting phenomenon itself, saying: “The betting exchange business model is different from ours and it fulfils a market demand, but how we interact with them is a new issue. I don’t have a clear answer on how to work with or against them.”
However, he does have an unobscured view on the second distribution pathway – pictures, “which give the punter the ability to see the race live. People won’t bet as much if they can’t see the race, and that’s where Racing World is so important.”
The third pathway involves data and information, which de Francis says is vital to give the punter everything he needs to make an informed wager.
“Together they make up a three-legged stool,” he explains. “If one leg is not there, you’ll fall over. In North America we control all three, through AmTote, HRTV and Xpressbet, but in different markets it’s almost certain we will choose to partner others.”
Expansion remains on the cards for Magna, de Francis says, but while he is reluctant never to say ‘Never’, the US race-track portfolio appears to be full – with The Meadows harness racing venue almost sold – and there are no plans to extend beyond Austria’s Magna Racino in Europe.
However, AmTote is steadily moving over; the New York Racing Association franchise, which is up for grabs next year, is being strenuously pursued, “with partners”, because “it’s an important part of the North American landscape and provides a very important piece of content,” and 500 slot machines are on standby for Gulfstream Park, as a forerunner of the model for other racecourse-casino sites.
Remington Park’s fortunes have already been transformed by the introduction of slots – much of the $12.5m, second-quarter revenue increase in the Magna’s southern US operations came from the introduction of the casino facility there last November - and de Francis points to improved revenues, better purses for owners and better quality racing as benefits that will flow from these and other developments in technology over the next five years.
“There will be an enormous evolution in our business generally,” he forecasts. “We’re going to be in many more geographical markets, with much more content available in homes, so that people will be able to access the racing product like never before. We’re being presented with a unique set of challenges.”
THE MAGNA ENTERTAINMENT CORP. EMPIRE
Original parent company Magna International Inc. is a diversified automotive parts supplier, based in Canada and founded by Frank H Stronach, currently chairman and interim chief executive.
Stronach, born in Weiz, Austria, on 6 September 1932, emigrated to Canada in 1954 with a background in tool and machine engineering. He started his first tool and die company in 1957, branched out into automotive components and after a merger of companies MII was formed in 1973, and has grown into one of the world’s biggest of its kind.
Under reorganisation of the corporate structure in November 1999, the non-automotive businesses and real estates assets, including recently acquired race tracks, were transferred to Magna Entertainment Corp, which became a public company, quoted on Nasdaq and Toronto Stock Exchange in March 2000. Executive office in Aurora, Ontario, Canada, but incorporated in Delaware, USA.
RACE TRACKS
USA
Golden Gate Fields: Albany, California; acquired in Dec ’99; 105 racing days.
Great Lakes Downs: Muskegon, Michigan; acquired in Feb ’00; 120 racing days.
Gulfstream Park: Hallandale Beach, Florida; acquired Sept ’99; races during winter months.
Laurel Park: Laurel, Maryland; majority interest acquired with Pimlico Nov ’02; two near-four-month meetings at either end of year split by three-week August meeting.
Lone Star Park: Grand Prairie, Texas; acquired Oct ’02; thoroughbred racing April to mid-July, quarter horse racing October and November.
The Meadows: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; acquired April ’01; year-round harness racing on 210 days; in process of being sold for $200m.
Pimlico: Baltimore, Maryland; majority interest acquired with Laurel Park Nov ’02; 8-week spring meeting includes Preakness Stakes.
Portland Meadows: Portland, Oregon; operated by MEC since ’01; races from October to April.
Remington Park: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; thoroughbred racing August to November, quarter horse racing March to June; year-round simulcasting and casino.
Santa Anita Park: Arcadia, California; two seasons, 26 December to mid-April, six-week Oak Tree meeting in autumn.
Thistledown: North Randall, Ohio; acquired in Nov ’99; races 185 days March to December.
Europe
Magna Racino (Ebreichsdorf, Austria; built April ’01; thoroughbred and harness racing from April to November; year-round gaming and entertainment.
WAGERING
XpressBet: for US-based punters only, in states where legal; launched ’02; HQ in Washington, Pennsylvania; off-track betting facilities and national account wagering business, by telephone and internet; covers pari-mutuel betting from over 100 thoroughbred, harness and quarter horse tracks in North America and races in Australia, Dubai and South Africa; offers real-time audio and video streaming; bets co-mingled with existing race track pools.
MagnaBet: European-based online, mobile phone and SMS service, for non-US customers; launched ’04; covers pari-mutuel betting on races from US, Austria, Germany and UK; offers real-time and recorded audio and video streaming; bets co-mingled with existing race track pools.
TELEVISION
HorseRacing TV (HRTV): owns and operates 24-hour network focused on horseracing; available to more than 11m cable and satellite viewers in US.
The Racetrack Television Network (RTN): one-third interest in direct-to-home, subscription telecasting service from MEC and other tracks, made available to betting shops internationally.
Racing World: one-third partner since January ’06 with Racing UK and Churchill Downs in international TV channel, currently broadcasting US racing to Britain and Ireland.
OTHERS
AmTote International: leading provider of totalisator services to international pari-mutuel industry; 30% interest bought for $3.8m in August ’03; notice given of intention to take up option on remaining 70% of equity in two stages, September and November ’06, for total of $14m.
Thoroughbred training centres: San Diego, California; Palm Beach County, Florida; Baltimore, Maryland.
Production facilities: for Streu-Fex, straw-based, horse bedding product, in North Carolina and Austria.
Real estate: two golf courses (in Austria and Canada) and related recreational facilities; residential developments in US, Austria and Canada.
Employs 5,300 through the group.
PARIMAX
Holding company formed in February ’06 to oversee development of XpressBet, HRTV, RaceONTV, Magnabet, AmTote, Racing World and PremiereWin (TV partner in central Europe).
Kiaran McLaughlin - a veteran who has enjoyed international success
By participating in the last two runnings of the Kentucky Derby, trainer Kiaran McLaughlin has raised his profile among casual observers of the North American racing scene. But for those who follow the sport regularly, McLaughlin is known as a veteran horseman who has enjoyed international success.
David Grening (European Trainer - issue 14 - Summer 2008)
By participating in the last two runnings of the Kentucky Derby, trainer Kiaran McLaughlin has raised his profile among casual observers of the North American racing scene. But for those who follow the sport regularly, McLaughlin is known as a veteran horseman who has enjoyed international success.
During a career that began in the early 1980’s, McLaughlin served as an assistant to North America’s most prolific trainer, D. Wayne Lukas; he handled the business affairs for the talented, but troubled jockey Chris Antley and oversaw the training of 200 horses for the Maktoum family of the United Arab Emirates.
The trainer of a public stable since 2003, McLaughlin has built his operation to 75 horses based at two locations in New York. While the Maktoum family accounts for approximately half of his stable, McLaughlin has several North American-based clients as well.
In 2005, McLaughlin came within one-half length of pulling one of the biggest upsets in Kentucky Derby history when Closing Argument, a 71-1 longshot, was outfinished by 50-1 shot Giacomo. McLaughlin returned to the Kentucky Derby in 2006, saddling fourth-place finisher Jazil for Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid al Maktoum’s Shadwell Farm as well as 14th-place finisher Flashy Bull for the North American syndicate West Point Thoroughbreds, LLC.
McLaughlin could have had a third runner in the Derby, but he and owner John Dillon decided to pass the race with the multiple stakes winning gelding Like Now, who ran in the Preakness instead.
McLaughlin, 45, has navigated the last eight years of his life while suffering from Multiple Sclerosis, a neurological disease that affects the brain and spinal cord. He was diagnosed with the disease in October 1998, not long before he won Aqueduct’s Grade 2 Knickerbocker Handicap with Sahm, owned by Shadwell.
“When I was first diagnosed in October of 1998 I went into a depression,” McLaughlin said. “I didn’t realize it at the time but I was depressed for 30 days. I didn’t want to get off the couch. Sahm won the Knickerbocker and I wasn’t there at the races.”
At that time, McLaughlin was splitting his time between Dubai and North America. By early December of 1998 he was back in Dubai and in February of 1999, he suffered a major setback when he developed blurred vision and needed a cane to walk.
For the last seven years, he has taken a daily injection of Copaxine, a class of drug called beta interferon, which inhibits certain white blood cells and in some studies has reduced the severity and number of multiple sclerosis attacks.
“I went on medication in June 1999 and since then I had no setbacks at all,” McLaughlin said “I feel very fortunate. I have MS, but I have it in my hip pocket.”
McLaughlin is a native of Lexington, Ky., and attended the University of Kentucky before working for trainers James Burchell and John Hennig, who would later become his father-in-law, David Kassen and Tim Muckler.
In 1985, McLaughlin started working for Lukas, where he worked closely with the multiple champion filly Open Mind, and stakes winners Slew City Slew and Dynaformer. In 1992, McLaughlin and his wife Letty, the sister of New York trainer Mark Hennig, wanted to settle down with their infant daughter. So, McLaughlin quit Lukas and began booking mounts for jockey Chris Antley, one of the more talented riders on the New York circuit.
But after 18 months, Antley fell out of favor with the top New York trainers and soon left for California. McLaughlin, through acquaintances such as Helen Alexander, Anthony Stroud and Rick Nichols, was offered a position in Dubai to work for Mohammed al Maktoum’s Godolphin Racing.
“I had 100 horses to train then later I ended up breaking 100 yearlings,” McLaughlin said. “I had a lot of good help, but I was overseeing 200 horses so I was just like a European trainer with a big yard.”
McLaughlin quickly learned there many differences between training in Dubai and America. First and foremost was the fact that medication was prohibited in Dubai.
“That was an education,” McLaughlin said. “I remember I had a filly, one of the first runners I had that was absolutely a crazy filly. She threw herself down on the racetrack more than once. I said to the vet what can we do? We’ve got to do something to settle her nerves. He said you can’t do anything to medicate here. On the track in Dubai she was perfect. So you live and learn that medication is really overrated”.
McLaughlin said the anti-bleeding medication Lasix is not overrated. It is a medication he uses on most of his horses that race in North America. “Lasix is not overrated,” McLaughlin said. “But as medication goes a lot of people think you need Bute and anti-inflammatories, and this and that, and it was proved to me that you didn’t. But Lasix is an important performance-enhancing drug because I just feel like a lot of horses bleed. I wouldn’t take a horse to Dubai that is a bleeder.”
McLaughlin was the leading trainer at Nad al Sheba in Dubai three times: 1994-95; 1995-96, and 2002-03. Among the top horses McLaughlin trained during his time in Dubai were Dumaani, who won the $1.5 million, Group 2 Keio Hai Springs Cup in Japan and Key of Luck, who won the inaugural running of the Dubai Duty Free.
``Key of Luck was probably the best horse I trained,’’ McLaughlin said. ``He won the [Dubai] Duty free by 20 lengths the night Cigar won the World Cup.’’
While McLaughlin learned about medication, he helped bring about a few changes in Dubai racing. McLaughlin helped introduce outriders to Dubai.
“They were asking my opinion on improvements for there,’’ McLaughlin said. ``When I first went over there they didn’t have any outriders. My point was if a rider went down in a race you’d need to stop the race if it was once around. And they got outriders.’’
McLaughlin also introduced the concept of keeping assistant starters in the stall with the horses. ``The starting gate was a real interesting situation when I first got there,’’ McLaughlin said. ``The first horse I had that was meant to run went in and a horse next to him flipped. The rider stepped off my horse because he was acting up and they opened the doors and had a false start. My horse went loose and had to be scratched. I said to them back them out, but they didn’t have the personnel. They’d load them and duck under the front door so they were not in with them. So there were a lot of things to talk about; the starting gate was a big issue.’’
While McLaughlin said he enjoyed the lifestyle of Dubai, something he said was akin to Disney World, he and Letty wanted to raise their two children, daughter Erin, 15, and son Ryan, 12, in America.
``It was hard to leave, it was a great lifestyle for my wife and I having a maid and a cook; we were living like kings and queens,’’ McLaughlin said. ``We opted to come back to America and raise our kids in New York. That’s where our home is and we just felt like it was the right thing to do.’’
McLaughlin enjoyed success right away in 2003. Among his stable stars were the Irish-bred Volga, who won the Grade 1 E.P Taylor at Woodbine, and the South African-bred Trademark, who won the Bernard Baruch and Fourstardave, both Grade 2 events at Saratoga.
In 2004, McLaughlin won 84 races from 462 starters and his horses earned more than $5.5 million in purse money. He won multiple stakes with the likes of Seattle Fitz, Randaroo, and Bending Strings.
In 2005, McLaughlin won 60 races from 424 starters. In addition to saddling Closing Argument to a second-place finish in the Kentucky Derby, McLaughlin also sent out Henny Hughes to a second-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile just three weeks after taking over the training of the horse.
In addition to training, McLaughlin has got involved with many of the off-the-track issues confronting racing. He is on the board of directors of the New York Thoroughbred Horseman’s Association, which is trying to get their voice heard on many issues confronting New York racing.
In New York, slot machines are on the horizon which should bring a significant increase to that state’s purse structure. There is also the issue of who will win the franchise to operate the three New York tracks: Aqueduct, Belmont and Saratoga. The New York Racing Association currently holds the franchise, but that is about to expire on Dec. 31, 2007.
``Sometimes in New York we get down that we don’t have slots and the purses aren’t where they could be. but the purses are damn good when you look around the country,’’ McLaughlin said. ``The slots would be just a huge raise for us and help us out and hopefully we get there sooner or later.’’
McLaughlin said he would prefer to remain training horses in North America for a long time. He did not, however, rule out returning to Dubai some day.
“Not if I’m doing as well as I’m doing now, I wouldn’t,’’ McLaughlin said. ``But I wouldn’t totally rule it out because it’s a great lifestyle. It’s just that if I’m doing well I would probably just stay here and make my lifestyle great here also.’’
The Lone Star phenomenon - built for big things
Maybe it’s because of the long, flat stretches of landscape that, when shimmering in the summer heat, have potential for mirage. Or maybe it’s just the capacious grandeur of a land vast as imagination. But whatever the reason, Texas always has inspired dreams and ideas so big and robust they couldn’t sit comfortably anywhere else.
Gary West (European Trainer - issue 7 - Spring 2004)
Maybe it’s because of the long, flat stretches of landscape that, when shimmering in the summer heat, have potential for mirage. Or maybe it’s just the capacious grandeur of a land vast as imagination. But whatever the reason, Texas always has inspired dreams and ideas so big and robust they couldn’t sit comfortably anywhere else.
To attempt anything on a small scale here is an insult to Texas heritage. And back in the mid-1990s, when developers and racing executives were planning a new racetrack for the Dallas area, a racetrack that was to be the jewel of Texas’ inchoate racing industry, they invested their plans with the dream of some day hosting the sport’s championship event. Everything was planned and created with the Breeders’ Cup championships in mind, recalled Corey Johnsen, the first general manager of Lone Star Park at Grand Prairie. Everything was built so that it could be stretched or expanded when necessary to Breeders’ Cup proportions.
And on October 30th 2004, in only its eighth season, Lone Star will become the youngest racetrack ever to be host to, as it’s now called, the Breeders’ Cup World Thoroughbred Championships. The eight races worth at least $14 million typically attract the most accomplished racehorses in North America, as well as many of the best from Europe. This year the Breeders’ Cup will take its excellence and its pageantry and its enduring significance to a new region, specifically to Grand Prairie, Texas.
But don’t misunderstand. Grand Prairie isn’t a hiccup of a town in a Larry McMurtry novel; it’s a fast-growing city in the geographic centre of a metropolitan area of five million people. To the east, about 12 miles distant, the Dallas skyline is visible from the upper levels of the Lone Star grandstand. A few miles west, near one of the nation’s most famous amusement parks, the Ballpark in Arlington is home to Major League Baseball’s Texas Rangers. A little farther west sits Fort Worth, which claims to be the only city that owns a herd of longhorn steers, and who would dispute it? Here the West is said to begin. And about 10 miles north of Lone Star Park, the Dallas Cowboys, who have won more Super Bowls than any team in the history of professional football, pursue yet another while playing at Texas Stadium.
In the sports world Texas is probably best known for football and in the general awareness for cowboys of all sorts. But, again, don’t misunderstand. This country, tamed on horseback, was made for horse racing; both the sport and the region have a prodigious capacity for inspiring dreams. And indeed Texas has a rich, if disjointed, history of racing.
In the mid-1930s, Arlington Downs, located about where The Ballpark in Arlington now stands, was one of the most successful racetracks in America. Crowds of 30,000 filled the grandstand on weekends. Newspapers of the time speak of dignitaries from around the world attending Arlington Downs. In 1937, Ben Jones topped the trainers’ standings. Jones, of course, went on to win six Kentucky Derbies, the first in 1938 with Lawrin, who had raced at Arlington Down the previous season. Racetracks also prospered in Houston and San Antonio.
If politicians hadn’t intervened, Texas quite possibly would have become the horse racing capital of North America. But the state’s racing industry instead became the victim of an acrimonious political dispute. In 1938 it was banned in the state. And so for the next 50 years, Texans simply raced elsewhere.
In 1946, as America and indeed the world recovered from an epidemic hostility, a Texas-bred racehorse named Assault supplied the raw material for hope and myth. He was raw-boned and deformed, and he had the most unlikely provenance. Yet with a sweep of the Triple Crown, the little chestnut known as the "clubfooted comet" became a prominent character in the eternally appealing story of determination's triumph.
And for Texans, he was much more; he was their representative.
"The victory of Assault in the Kentucky Derby," wrote an editorialist of the time, "is but one example, if example is needed, that this great southwestern section of America is on the march and will be heard from in increasing proportions in every phase of American activity, and none more strongly than in the field of the horse."Assault was bred, born and raised on a vast expanse once called the "Wild Horse Desert" but later famous as the King Ranch. When he was a weanling, he stepped on a surveyor's spike. It ran through the frog, of the right
front foot and out the hoof wall. The injury left the foot deformed and the horse crippled.
And so even years later Assault walked with a conspicuous limp and would sometimes stumble and fall when going to the racetrack. But once there, he ran
with surprising grace and efficiency and, most of all, courage. Perhaps that was the source of his charisma. Overcoming his misfortune and his lameness to become
the seventh horse ever to win the Triple Crown, he became a popular hero and for many an embodiment of courageous spirit.
After the Triple Crown, Assault was "the main topic" of conversation throughout Texas, according to a contemporary newspaper account. So popular was he that his
admirers developed "some fantastic schemes" to satisfy "the public's clamor" and allow "the rank and file of Texans who were not able to witness the 3-year-old
in action . . . to catch a glimpse" of him.
People petitioned Gov. Coke Stevenson to issue a proclamation honouring Assault and making his jockey, New York native Warren Mehrtens, an honorary Texan.
Sentiment grew for returning horse racing to the state. There was even a plan to raise $100,000 for "a special race, without betting, of course," intended to attract Assault.
"Everybody knew about Assault," remembered Monte Moncrief, who at the time was a Texas A&M student but who later became the King Ranch veterinarian. "We were highly proud. Just as Dallas is proud of the Cowboys, Texas was proud of Assault. . . . When Assault won the Triple Crown, it was like Joe Louis beating Max Schmeling."
Yes, although no horses raced in Texas for more than 50 years – not with legal betting anyway – the state still can boast of a rich racing history that’s fraught with achievement. But most Texans, such as Hall of Fame jockeys Bill Shoemaker and Jerry Bailey and Hall of Fame trainer Max Hirsch, had to leave the state to pursue their racing careers.
Even without racing at home, Texans remained prominent in the sport, developing successful breeding farms in Kentucky and campaigning stakes winners from New York to California and from Ascot to Chantilly. Throughout the 1980s, racetracks in neighbouring states, such as Louisiana Downs and Oaklawn Park, prospered in part because of the many Texans that regularly travelled three-to-six hours to attend the races.
Racing returns
Then in 1987, the state’s politicians, who for 50 years had kept the sport underfoot, finally turned the issue over to the voters, who in a statewide referendum overwhelmingly welcomed horse racing back to Texas.
Problems persisted, however. The Texas Racing Commission, which regulates the sport in the state, could have produced a new translation of the Bible in less time than it took to write the state’s rules of racing. An onerous pari-mutuel tax virtually precluded the substantial investment necessary to develop any large racetrack, and so the first racetracks to open in Texas during this modern period were insignificant.
Once the tax was lowered, the Commission dragged its tentative feet in awarding licenses. The Dallas area was a proven market for the sport, having supplied about 50 percent of the attendance at nearby Louisiana Downs for years. A Dallas racetrack was destined to stand at the centre of the state’s racing industry. But the Commission put off awarding a license in the Dallas area, deciding first to license racetracks in Houston and then San Antonio.
Finally, the Commission awarded the coveted Dallas area license to Lone Star Park over three other applicants. The citizens of Grand Prairie had voted for a half-cent sales tax to help finance the $100 million Lone Star project. Nevertheless, as the new racetracks in Houston and San Antonio struggled, Lone Star developers met with considerable scepticism from banks asked to provide additional financing. But in 1995, famed real estate developer Trammell Crown and his son Harlan injected $10 million into the project. The state’s horsemen pledged another $5 million. And the dirt soon began flying at the Lone Star site.
On a Thursday afternoon in April of 1997, 60 years after the closing of Arlington Downs, a crowd of 21,754 filled Lone Star’s Spanish baroque grandstand and welcomed major league racing back to North Texas. A couple days later, Bob Baffert, the leading trainer in the nation, saddled the winners of two stakes races, Anet in the Lone Star Derby and Isitingood in the Texas Mile. Skip Away, who finished third in the inaugural Texas Mile, would go on to become Horse of the Year.
For its first season, Lone Star averaged nearly 10,000 in daily attendance. The average daily handle of $2.39 million was a record for an inaugural season by any North American racetrack built since 1970. No little house on the prairie, it immediately became the success story many had anticipated for decades; it became, in other words, the racetrack Texans had envisioned when they voted in 1987 to bring racing back to the state.
Since then, most, if not all, of the nation’s leading jockeys have competed at Lone Star, many of them in the annual National Thoroughbred Racing Association All-Star Jockey Championship. And the nation’s leading trainers – such as Bobby Frankel, Bill Mott, Richard Mandella, Todd Pletcher and Steve Asmussen have raced their horses in Grand Prairie. In fact, Asmussen, who currently sits atop the North American standings in both victories and earnings, is Lone Star’s all-time leading trainer. And many of North America’s leading horses have raced around the Lone Star oval, including Congaree, Real Quiet, Answer Lively, Hal’s Hope, Sir Bear, Bluesthestandard and Hallowed Dreams.
Since the track opened, more than 8.8 million people have attended Lone Star and have wagered more than $1.7 billion.
In 2002, Magna Entertainment, which also operates Santa Anita and Gulfstream Park, purchased Lone Star. Since then, in anticipation of the Breeders’ Cup, three new barns have been built, including a 96-stall quarantine barn. When nearly $8 million in capital improvements are completed, the winner’s circle and paddock areas will be expanded and the seating augmented to accommodate a crowd of 50,000. A new banquet room is also under construction.
Lone Star is accepting ticket applications for the Breeders’ Cup at lonestarpark.com. The deadline for applying is June 4.
What you need to know
Lone Star’s regular season runs from April to mid-July. But to accommodate the Breeders’ Cup, the track will have a special championship season, starting Oct. 1 and continuing through Oct. 31.
During October, the North Texas weather is like Goldilocks’ favourite bowl of porridge, neither too hot nor too cold. The average high temperature for the month is 78, with an average low of 56. The average high on Oct. 30, by the way, is 72, and the average low 51. The record high for October is 90, recorded back in 1951. In other words, if you endured the weather in Southern California this past year, you’ll love Texas in October.
Lone Star will offer 14 stakes races, in addition to the Breeders’ Cup events, during its October season. The opening weekend will feature stakes races that could serve as Breeders’ Cup preps – the Silver Spur for 2-year-old fillies, the Middleground for 2-year-old colts and geldings, and the Alysheba for 3-year-old sprinters. The $250,000 Lone Star Derby and the $150,000 Stonerside Stakes for 3-year-old fillies will be run Oct. 29.
The Dallas area is one of the most dynamic sports markets in America, with professional basketball, soccer, hockey, football and baseball teams. Moreover, a series of festive events, including concerts, are planned leading up to the Breeders’ Cup.
Around the ovals
Lone Star has a one-mile dirt track, with chutes for 1 ¼-mile and seven-furlong races. Inside the track, as is typical with American racetracks, is a seven-furlong turf course, with a chute angling across the infield.
When the track first opened and its turf was immature, horses with early speed enjoyed considerable success. Because of that, the turf course developed a reputation for favouring speed. And that reputation, although confuted by hard evidence, lingers. Over the last four years, half of the 480 turf races around two turns have been won by horses that rallied – that is, by horses that were more than four lengths behind the early leader. And only 16 percent of the turf races have been won by horses on or near the early lead.
The main track, on the other hand, seems to offer an advantage to tactical speed. The race is not always to the swift, as the prophet pointed out, but at Lone Star a modicum of early speed generally proves valuable. Horses that have sufficient speed to gain an early advantage or to race within a half-length of the early lead win more than a third of the sprints. But the most effective style is stalking – that is, racing close to the early leaders, within four lengths, and then pouncing in the stretch. Late-running types win about 18 percent of the races.
In two-turn races on the main track, the victories spread out somewhat more evenly among the three running styles. But stalkers again tend to have an advantage, winning nearly 40 percent of the races. Horses that rally from more than four lengths back win about 26 percent of the two-turn races.
Few places in America have packaged the joy and excitement of racing more effectively. Lone Star quite simply is a fun place to attend the races. And on Oct. 30, it’ll become the host racetrack for the sport’s championship event. Lone Star and indeed all of Texas racing could be very much like the diminutive colt who 58 years ago outran early difficulties to attain enduring glory.