Alberta Downs

[BreadandButter]

Anyone know what's going on?

This is posted on their web site.

Due to negative pressure from the northern Alberta racing industry, the jockey's that Alberta Downs had scheduled to ride have decide not to ride. Therefore we will have to cancel Sunday June 5 racing.

We will be bringing in Jockeys from the Caribbean and will reschedule our opening day to Sunday June 12.

The post time for Gulfstream simulcast will be 11am and live thoroughbred racing starts at 3:15pm. Try out our new "Rainbow 6" with $100,000 guarantee. We apologize for any inconvenience and hope that you will stick with as we do our best to bring live Thoroughbred racing to our central Alberta race fans!

[AlsoEligible]

The rumor I've heard is that Gulfstream is going to offer the races from Alberta at the end of their own live card, like what they do with South American racing now.

So unless you're actually at Alberta, you won't be able to wager on the live Alberta card. But you can wager the same races by betting Gulfstream races 11-16, or whatever races it ends up being.

Doesn't make a lot of sense to me, but that's just what I'm hearing. It would at least explain why they're offering a Rainbow 6 on the card.

[Pensacola Pete]

It's likely (and this is just speculation on my part) that the horsemen at Northlands Park had something to do with it. Northlands is closing after this season. While there's no conflict in scheduling (Alberta will only be racing on Sundays, and Northlands is dark on Sundays), Alberta probably would take some horses away from Northlands, and fields are already small there.

Gulfstream already adds simulcast races from various locations on Friday and Saturday but doesn't have any (that I know of) on Sunday, which is probably why they agreed to take Alberta.