Finger Lakes stakes schedule decimated

[FantasticDan]

A massive funding cut to Finger Lakes from the New York Thoroughbred Breeding & Development Fund (due to lack of NYCOTB revenue) results in the cancelling of 9 of the 13 scheduled stakes races for this meet..

http://www.fingerlakesracetrack.com/new-york-horse-racing_3497.aspx

[PaceAdvantage]

Good thing they have a casino... :rolleyes:

You would think that very fact would enable them to make up this unexpected shortfall.

[sonnyp]

at least they're trying to keep as much money in the overnights to the benefit of the local horsemen.

i believe, in most of those nybred stakes, the bigger outfits ship in from aqueduct,belmont and saratoga to take the greatest portion of those purses.

[cj]

at least they're trying to keep as much money in the overnights to the benefit of the local horsemen.

i believe, in most of those nybred stakes, the bigger outfits ship in from aqueduct,belmont and saratoga to take the greatest portion of those purses.

Isn't that what always happens though? Seems like everything is always done to the benefit of local horsemen.

[FantasticDan]

With NYCOTB gone, I was curious about how FL's handle would be as the meet began - NYCOTB accounted for more than 25% of FL's total handle.

Nice to see that it's been fine, and maybe even a little better than usual.. they've easily broken $1M on each of their non-NYRA race days so far, which is a good benchmark for them..

[Tom]

We had a Gr3 stake once - Groovy even came here and won it.
But shippers always won it, so they got rid of it.....

Too bad the moronic laws prohibit people who live nearby and WANT to bet the track from doing so. I could never understand the sense in restricting ability to watch races or bet them. FL cannot show its races live to us in NY or let us in this area bet them. Great mind run this game....GILLIGAN! d'oh!

[PaceAdvantage]

Not to take this thread too off stride, but looking at the Finger Lakes website, isn't it interesting how they highlight all the folks who have hit jackpots in their casino at the top of the page, complete with payouts and photos.

I had no idea nobody has ever hit a four figure superfecta on track at Finger Lakes before, where they couldn't get their photo up on the website... :bang:

[onefast99]

They are one of the quickest tracks to payout purse monies, GP is the best and by far Mountaineer and Parx are tied for the worst!

[FantasticDan]

Too bad the moronic laws prohibit people who live nearby and WANT to bet the track from doing so. I could never understand the sense in restricting ability to watch races or bet them. FL cannot show its races live to us in NY or let us in this area bet them.Live streaming video was added to their website with the start of this year's meet. The law that previously forbid that was adjusted in response to the closure of NYCOTB. I have no clue about the betting aspect of it, since I rarely bet these days unless I'm visiting the track.

[Tom]

Correct-mundo. I was not aware.
Only works on IE, though, not FF.

PA, you will notice that while we don't have any big winners on the homepage, we DO have Blues Traveler booked!

Life is good under the thumb.

[classhandicapper]

Finger Lakes one of the hottest tracks at NYC OTB (especially on a dark day).

I mentioned several times that people were focusing almost exclusively on whether NYRA would be able to make up the revenue shortfall, but there are a lot of other tracks that are going to feel the pinch too.

I noticed that NYRA stated that they are making up the "net revenue" shortfall now because they are keeping a higher percentage of every dollar bet at the track than at OTB, but I haven't seen any mention of the increased costs. NYRA needs additional on track clerks, phone clerks, bus service, LIRR deals, people to process more phone accounts etc... Those costs were previously carried by OTB or OTB's customers.

I was at Belmont opening day and they had a really nice crowd, but I kept hearing people complain about how they got shut out because of the lack of clerks.

But the real issue (which is not getting addressed by anyone but me) is that the NYRA pools are way less liquid now. NYRA may be keeping a higher percentage of each dollar bet, but less money is being bet. That's bad for everyone because smaller bets can move the prices more often and by a greater amount. But even worse is that the millions formerly bet by OTB patrons was among the dumbest money bet anywhere in America and a lot of it is gone. So the game (esepcially NYRA) is now a hell of lot tougher to beat.

[FantasticDan]

Some good news for Finger Lakes & NYRA - $820K in purse enrichment funds:

http://www.thoroughbredtimes.com/national-news/2011/08/04/nyra-finger-lakes-receive-purse-boosts.aspx