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[rrbauer]

Not sure what Del Mar's takeout pct has to do with any of this. It's been the same takeout on exotics since 2004 when they raised it 1/2 point for workers comp relief (and then let the raise stick even after the state instituted additional workers comp relief for all businesses including horse racing).

Reducing the cost of entry from $1 to 50-cents causes the following:

1. A few more people will play the P4 but it is extremely uninformed money that overbets favorites, so you have more money chasing the favorite-dominated combinations.

2. The regular P4 players get more bang for their bucks. Hence they can cover the same combination spread for less money; or, cover a larger spread for the same money (than they could for a $1 bet). It may also be that regluar P4 players will play a few more P4's because they can go deeper for the same/less money in P4's that they would've "passed" on previously when it was a $1 minimum.

For someone really interested in how this experiment has fared, looking at the charts for last year, and this year will yield the pool totals on a day-by-day basis. What you would expect this year is last year's totals less some percentage (the overall decline in all handle). If this year's totals are more than last year's adjusted totals, then lowering the bet minimum has been "successful". I doubt that there will be much said by the track about how the experiment fared unless it was at least marginally successful.