belmont racetrack fans status
 

Hi

The belmont spring meet starts in 8 days, no word on letting fans in yet. I reached out, crickets?

Does anyone know if this place is opening? Pretty frustrating

Pretty ridiculous since people have been able to go to the casinos for months.

Hopefully NYRA has some type of plan but it is quite odd to not hear anything about it so close the start of the meet. They need some sort of litmus test before Saratoga opens back up as well. One thing is for sure , don’t expect any on track attendance records to be broken this year at either track. There are folks on here who actually believe Saratoga will match or exceed attendance to pre covid levels this year. It’s just plain silly to believe that.

Santa Anita is letting people in on the rare occasions when it actually hosts a horse racing card. NYRA should do it too unless the Nassau County health authorities prohibit it.

Called my local state rep and directed to another regional state rep and no response to my question of fans at Belmont and Saratoga

NYRA Comms Director has been tweeting this general message through April:

Uggh. Not NYRA's fault.

This seems like a no brainer for whoever grants permission to NYRA even if it comes with some caps on total attendance and/or indoor restrictions. They are letting people into closed arenas like MSG. How do you not let people into a wide open outdoor space like Belmont's paddock area or grandstand. There are a few spots that are kind of closed off. You could easily put caps on some of that indoor stuff if they insist and have way less risk than many things that are already approved. Belmont is huge and mostly open.

I'm getting rank under restraint here. It's time to give me my head and let me run. #VaccinatedHorseplayers

Yes. People are getting vaccinated, and racetracks can operate mostly outdoors. And we are not talking about thousands of people here. NY State needs to get on the ball on this.

Cuomo has announced Belmont will allow fans at Belmont The Newsday story says 20 percent
Spectators will be able to watch horses race at Belmont and other racetracks in New York, starting Friday next week, with the state revising guidelines for those venues to relax coronavirus restrictions.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo told reporters during a telephonic briefing Wednesday afternoon that the state will allow horse and auto racing, starting April 23, with capacity limited at 20% for outdoor events, "in line with our guidance for other events," he said.

Was the hashtag a joke or what??...:faint:

I had my second shot.

Bill Gates can now monitor all my gambling activities via microchips and piggy back on my biggest plays. I'm expecting a lot of late money on my best ideas. ;)

Gov. Andrew Cuomo just announced 20 percent capacity at race tracks beginning April 23.

Depending on the weather, I may have to play hookey from work next Friday.

Allan

What constitutes 20% of capacity at Belmont? The place has seating capacity of almost 33,000 (including picnic tables and benches but not sitting on the grass). NYRA lists total capacity at 90,000+.

So will they limit attendance to 6,600 or 18,000? NYRA did not say. Guess they're getting guidance from the state.