Recruiting runners - the lengths racing secretaries are going to to field runners for their races

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By Bill Heller From New York to California, racing secretaries are working diligently to recruit horses, a task made significantly more difficult by the ongoing pandemic. “Everybody is struggling to get horses,” New York Racing Association Senior Vice-President of Racing Operations Martin Panza said. “Everybody has empty stalls. Tracks that were running five days a week, now are running three or four.” Del Mar Racing Secretary David Jerkens put it this way: “It’s always a challenge. Any racing secretary in the country will tell you it’s hard to land new inventory.” Panza and Jerkens are veteran executives who have seen good times and bad. Santa Anita’s Chris Merz began his first job as race secretary in February 2020. His timing couldn’t have been worse. “I think it was just before the pandemic,” Merz said. “You’re trying to come up with these ideas to get horses out here, and then you have the pandemic. Any plans get thrown out the window. Recruiting went out the window. You’re just trying to survive.” Thankfully, the New York Racing Association’s three tracks: Aqueduct, Belmont Park and Saratoga did survive, as did Santa Anita and Del Mar, which is the site of this year’s Breeders’ Cup. Yet the racing industry has shriveled considerably following the closing of Hollywood Park, the recent loss of Calder Raceway and, unless a miracle happens, Arlington Park. “If tracks such as Arlington go away, if you lose a city like Chicago and take a big track out of the picture, it hurts the industry,” Panza said. “They’re not going to build new tracks to replace Calder, Hollywood, Arlington Park. It’s sad what you lose, but it’s a sign of the times. The industry is changing so quickly. What maybe worked 15 years ago might not work today.” For smaller tracks, survival may depend on finding a niche. At Indiana Grand, Chris Polzin, who had been working at Arlington Park before moving to Indiana at the end of last October, was asked how his track competes with larger ones. “We race Monday through Thursday,” He said. “So we don’t really run against them. The big tracks gather all the attention. Who’s going to pay attention to us if we run on weekends?” In mid-March, a month before Indiana Grand opened its 2021 Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse meeting, Polzin said, “Our stalls are jam packed. We have 900 stabled. I’ve got a list of 140 stalls people want and there are none.” Mike Anifantis, the racing secretary at Prairie Meadows in Iowa, hopes his Thoroughbred/Quarter Horse meet, which runs from April 30 to September 26, will be smoother than 2020. “This year, obviously, is a little bit easier than last year,” he said. “We didn’t know when we were opening. This year, we’ve got 15 to 18 new trainers coming in and eight or nine people who couldn’t come last year. We start out with Thoroughbreds, then mixed breeds; both run on the same card.” Asked if it’s a challenge to survive, Anifantis replied, “It’s a challenge for sure.” Lone Star, which has both a Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse meeting, relies on its neighboring tracks. “We have a good circuit,” Lone Star Assistant Race Secretary Matt Crawford, a former trainer, said. “Sam Houston runs from January to April, then we start and run through July. Remington Park runs from August through December. We primarily get 75 to 80 percent of our horses from here. We get some horses from Oaklawn Park. We get some interest from Louisiana Downs, and it’s only a three-hour drive from Turf Paradise.” Asked about his hopes for this year’s meet, Crawford said, “We hope to be okay. It might be a little light the first couple of weeks. Around the first of May, we’ll start rolling pretty good.” Panza hopes that happens in New York despite the challenges all tracks are facing. “There’s a shortage of owners and a shortage of horses,” he said. “With the horse shortage, it takes a long time to recover or increase field size. We need dirt horses. If you add a trainer, you can add 40 to 50 horses. But there is some bright side to the industry to attract people. You have to look at the positives. Right now, the purses in Arkansas, Kentucky and New York are the highest purses we’ve ever seen. For New York, the purses we have for maidens, claimers and allowance races, hopefully, will attract owners.” Either way, the New York Racing Association didn’t stand pat, instituting The New York States Turf Bonus for its innovative Turf Triple series for three-year-old fillies, the Gr1 $700,000 Belmont Oaks Invitational at Belmont Park July 10th, the $700,000 Saratoga Oaks Invitational August 8th and the Jockey Club Oaks at Belmont. NYRA inaugurated the Turf Triple in 2019. The New York Stakes Turf Bonus gives $315,000 to the owner and $35,000 to the trainer of any previous winner of the Belmont Oaks, Saratoga Oaks or Jockey Club Oaks who captures the Gr2 $750,000 New York Stakes, a mile-and-a-quarter stakes, the following year. The Flower Bowl Bonus awards $300,000 to the owner and $30,000 to the trainer of any previous winner of those three filly stakes who captures the Gr1 $600,000 Flower Bowl at 11 furlongs the following year. “We’re really trying to strengthen those stakes,” Panza said. “Let’s help our three-year-old races and guide those horses to come back to race in New York as a four-year-old. We’ve made a commitment to reestablish longer races. It makes sense to get horses ready for the Breeders’ Cup. The trainers we’ve talked to, they said this seems like a very good idea. New York has these big, great turf courses. We’re committed to longer distances. We’re trying to keep it alive in the United States. We’ve been fortunate to get Europeans to run in our biggest races.” NYRA is also continuing its ship and win program for horsemen based at the Fair Hill Training Center in Maryland and Oaklawn Park, and recently held its sixth popular Claiming Championship series. Horses stabled in Fair Hill, who register an official start (excluding stakes races) during the Aqueduct spring meet from April 1st through April 18th or during the Belmont Park spring/summer meet from April 22nd through July 11, will be credited with an $800 shipping stipend. First-time starters must have had three previous workouts at Fair Hill to be eligible. Horses who made their previous start at Oaklawn Park can receive a 30% purse bonus and a $1,500 shipping stipend for a start at either Aqueduct or Belmont. First-time starters are not eligible. NYRA’s Claiming Championship Series held March 27th at Aqueduct offered 10 stakes worth $620,000; each stakes named for the most popular claiming horses to run at Aqueduct: Videogenic, Caixa Electronica, Xtra Heat, Kelly Kip, Belle Gallantey, Peeping Tom, More to Tell, Sis City, Stud Muffin and Dads Caps. “It’s a really strong program,” Trainer Rob Atras said three days before the races. “I think it’s good to have the spotlight on these types of horses, too.” Atras was in that spotlight when his American Power captured the $80,000 Caixa Electronica Stakes. Additionally, NYRA has boosted its purses for the Belmont and Saratoga meets. Maiden purses will be $90,000, and allowance races start at $92,000. The claiming purses are substantial. Purses at claiming levels of $10,000, $16,000, $25,000 and $62,500 will be worth $28,000, $42,000, $55,000 and $80,000, respectively. Taken collectively, the NYRA programs reflect a huge commitment to lure horsemen for a single reason, one that Panza pointed out: “Trying to attract horses is tough.” On the other side of the country, Santa Anita and Del Mar are getting positively proactive. “We’re getting more aggressive,” Merz said. “Starting in May, we’re recruiting horses. David Jerkens and I are going to Kentucky, Churchill Downs and Keeneland. In the summer, we’re planning to go to Florida and New York. Whenever they open, we’re planning on being there.” Santa Anita’s new, aggressive approach to recruiting runners comes from the top. “It was loosely done before,” Merz said. “We’ve got some new leadership here at Santa Anita, Nate Newby. He said we need to do whatever we can to better the horse population here. Get our product the best it can be. He said, `The gloves are off. Do whatever you can do.’ The Breeders’ Cup is at Del Mar this year. Guys are looking to have a start here. The word is getting out.” Regardless, Merz and Jerkens are hitting the road. “California is an odd place,” Merz said. “It’s talked about as an island. The days of sitting back and hoping people come out here are gone. We want to see people face-to-face. That’s what we’re trying to do.” Merz, a 30-year-old graduate of the University of Arizona Racetrack Industry Program, is happy to take on that challenge: “This is something I’ve always wanted to do—to be a race secretary and make California racing the best it can be.” To that end, Santa Anita increased purses 10% and added a Sunshine Bonus for shippers that began on December 26. A $3,000 bonus was paid to the owners of any horses that started who had not raced in California the previous 12 months. There is also a 35% bonus to the owners of those shippers who finish first through fifth in their first start at Santa Anita. Santa Anita also raised overnight purses by $15,000 on the day of the Santa Anita Handicap (March 6) and joined with Del Mar to initiate the $1 million Wild West Bonus to any horse who sweeps three mile-and-a-quarter Gr1 stakes, the $400,000 Santa Anita Handicap, the $300,000 Hollywood Gold Cup at Santa Anita May 31, and the $750,000 Pacific Classic at Del Mar August 21. “Like anything, it’s going to take a little while to resonate,” David Jerkens said. “I think we have signature races out here. We were looking for a way to get horses to ship out here for dirt stakes. Many of our dirt stakes horses go East. We’re trying to work more in tandem with Santa Anita, to build the best overall horse population for California. The fact that we host the Breeders’ Cup is something that will work for us. Owners have been contacting me.” To further entice out-of-state horsemen to ship to California, Del Mar has increased its ship and win program, rewarding eligible horses who haven’t raced in California for at least 12 months and are not first-time starters with bonuses of 40% in grass races and 50% in dirt races—up from 20 and 20 last year. Additionally, Del Mar is allowing horses who raced at Santa Anita in May or June to remain eligible for the bonus. “Seventy percent of the horses that get the bonus are from local connections that are gearing up for Del mar and acquiring horses,” Jerkins said. Traveling across the country to recruit horses will be new for Santa Anita but not for Del Mar. “This is my eighth year, and we’ve done it every year,” Jerkens said. “We’ll talk to as many horsemen as we can. We’re always trying to improve the product. Our goal is to present what we’re offering, and we have a good story to tell.”

By Bill Heller

From New York to California, racing secretaries are working diligently to recruit horses, a task made significantly more difficult by the ongoing pandemic.

“Everybody is struggling to get horses,” New York Racing Association Senior Vice-President of Racing Operations Martin Panza said. “Everybody has empty stalls. Tracks that were running five days a week, now are running three or four.” Del Mar Racing Secretary David Jerkens put it this way: “It’s always a challenge. Any racing secretary in the country will tell you it’s hard to land new inventory.” Panza and Jerkens are veteran executives who have seen good times and bad.

Santa Anita’s Chris Merz began his first job as race secretary in February 2020. His timing couldn’t have been worse. “I think it was just before the pandemic,” Merz said. “You’re trying to come up with these ideas to get horses out here, and then you have the pandemic. Any plans get thrown out the window. Recruiting went out the window. You’re just trying to survive.” Thankfully, the New York Racing Association’s three tracks: Aqueduct, Belmont Park and Saratoga did survive, as did Santa Anita and Del Mar, which is the site of this year’s Breeders’ Cup. Yet the racing industry has shriveled considerably following the closing of Hollywood Park, the recent loss of Calder Raceway and, unless a miracle happens, Arlington Park.

“If tracks such as Arlington go away, if you lose a city like Chicago and take a big track out of the picture, it hurts the industry,” Panza said. “They’re not going to build new tracks to replace Calder, Hollywood, Arlington Park. It’s sad what you lose, but it’s a sign of the times. The industry is changing so quickly. What maybe worked 15 years ago might not work today.”

Screenshot 2021-04-23 at 13.54.35.png

For smaller tracks, survival may depend on finding a niche. At Indiana Grand, Chris Polzin, who had been working at Arlington Park before moving to Indiana at the end of last October, was asked how his track competes with larger ones. “We race Monday through Thursday,” He said. “So we don’t really run against them. The big tracks gather all the attention. Who’s going to pay attention to us if we run on weekends?”

Scenics - IND - 071819 - 013 (1).jpg

In mid-March, a month before Indiana Grand opened its 2021 Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse meeting, Polzin said, “Our stalls are jam packed. We have 900 stabled. I’ve got a list of 140 stalls people want and there are none.”

In mid-March, a month before Indiana Grand opened its 2021 Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse meeting, Polzin said, “Our stalls are jam packed. We have 900 stabled. I’ve got a list of 140 stalls people want and there are none.” Mike Anifantis, the racing secretary at Prairie Meadows in Iowa, hopes his Thoroughbred/Quarter Horse meet, which runs from April 30 to September 26, will be smoother than 2020. “This year, obviously, is a little bit easier than last year,” he said. “We didn’t know when we were opening. This year, we’ve got 15 to 18 new trainers coming in and eight or nine people who couldn’t come last year. We start out with Thoroughbreds, then mixed breeds; both run on the same card.”Asked if it’s a challenge to survive, Anifantis replied, “It’s a challenge for sure.”

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Lone Star, which has both a Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse meeting, relies on its neighboring tracks. “We have a good circuit,” Lone Star Assistant Race Secretary Matt Crawford, a former trainer, said. “Sam Houston runs from January to April, then we start and run through July. Remington Park runs from August through December. We primarily get 75 to 80 percent of our horses from here. We get some horses from Oaklawn Park. We get some interest from Louisiana Downs, and it’s only a three-hour drive from Turf Paradise.” Asked about his hopes for this year’s meet, Crawford said, “We hope to be okay. It might be a little light the first couple of weeks. Around the first of May, we’ll start rolling pretty good.”…

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Rick Hammerle - from racing fan to racing secretary

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