Today's Daily NYRA Fiasco

[Robert Fischer]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

it's amazing how the vocal minority has managed to sabotage just about everything these days

people walk around afraid of their own shadows...thinking big bad twitter MAN, sorry...I mean X-MAN...is gonna jump out and write something terrible about you, or your company, or whatever

And then of course you OVERREACT like an idiot...

a couple more horses than normal break down during a meet?

GOTTA INSTALL SYNTHETIC...GOTTA MOVE THE MEET TO ANOTHER TRACK WHILE WE INVESTIGATE...GOTTA SHUT DOWN FOR A WEEK...LMAO

what have we become?

sadge

Like I said, combine all the deaths at Saratoga for 2021, 2022 and 2023...and you have just about a normal total if you also combine the 3 years prior to those...and then that compares to the 3 years prior to those...etc....etc....

BUT NO...FREAK OUT OVER ANOTHER STATISTICAL ANAMOLY thinking it's the end of the world...when in reality, it's perfectly normal if you step back and look at the forest.

Twitter

2017 and 2021 we had 21 breakdowns at Saratoga
since 2009-2022 we've averaged 13 breakdowns.

I'm not even sure how many we've had this year, but I am sure it's not some outrageous outlier of a number.

horses break down.

Sometimes they break down in clusters.

Sometimes a horse like New York Thunder has a problem with his right leg so I write him on one of my flawed-horses watch lists, but he's still too fast for me to bet against coming into the Jerkens, and he still runs so fast on his left lead that he goes undefeated in 4 starts and wins the G2 Amsterdam, and racing doesn't really have a way of denying an impressive G2 winner from a race like the Jerkens.

Maybe it's possible that it could have been seen if graded stakes required bone/tendon imaging to enter? I do not know that answer.

There's not always an answer for everything, but the reactionary bullshit needs to stop. PETA is not in favor of Tapeta racing.

yet people will blame the surface or whatever for New York Thunder.

__________________
Preparation. Discipline. Patience. Decisiveness.

[Bustin Stones]

In an era of technological advancement, a 15 year graph of injuries should have a negative slope. It takes investment and I can understand that in a shrinking industry that money is harder to find. By making it easier for the opponents of horse racing to validate their concerns, it will be even harder to find the money as customers abandon. It's the age old story of a business trying to save itself, falling behind, and riding itself to the bottom because it fails to believe in its future. If the Del Mar experiment is working, there's little excuse to not try it elsewhere.

[Robert Fischer]

Originally Posted by Bustin Stones

In an era of technological advancement, a 15 year graph of injuries should have a negative slope.

that would be preferred for sure

it's a short meet. Randomness will play a part. Weather will play a part.

secondly - I do not know the answer for certain, but was the meet extended between 2009 and the current racing calendar? It seems to be what I remember being the case, but I could be wrong about that.

edit - i still may not have the complete accurate information, but I think it was extended 36 -> 40 days in 2010. So that was earlier than i remembered in the timeline and in that case it wouldn't account for a lot other than one factor comparing '09 to '10

[$w1fT]

Surface won’t matter when you let guys like Delgado run.

https://www.horseracingnation.com/ne...tal_injury_123

NYRA consistently allows bad actors to populate its ranks and thinks putting in a surface that supports Cheap racing will better the product.

[Brass Hat]

Vowed I would not say anything about the Saratoga meet, but I am too grumpy to hold my tongue. I do not understand why, when there is a 12:40 post, the gates still do not open until 11, where, on the dot Mirimahdi starts reading the scratches. There is no one on the track grounds yet, he is reading to an empty track. Never made sense to me.

Also, for Travers day next year, could they go back to what used to be a tradition of showing Travers races from the past? It is almost as if they consider them too boring to show and would rather play moldy oldies from the 60's. It was always nice to watch them while killing hours before the first race, and reminiscing about the old horses.

[paulbenny]

Working there for 9 years, it was always a messy last day of the meet, because of the early post, school in session, people packing as the day started to get out of town as soon as possible. The race day was just a classic case of lets pack and get out of here, which is why the post was moved up, and it did not trickle down to adjusting all other aspects of the operation as I remember it. It is an unfortunate racing experience error in my view and you make sense.

[the little guy]

Originally Posted by paulbenny

Working there for 9 years, it was always a messy last day of the meet, because of the early post, school in session, people packing as the day started to get out of town as soon as possible. The race day was just a classic case of lets pack and get out of here, which is why the post was moved up, and it did not trickle down to adjusting all other aspects of the operation as I remember it. It is an unfortunate racing experience error in my view and you make sense.

Handle was over $25 million dollars today.

[paulbenny]

I am focusing on the racing experience, not the handle or the track condition. my work experience in that area, called customer experience is part of why I feel confident commenting on that aspect of the business. As a result, I do not get into the information regarding the total wagering. It is not the point of the customer based upon what I read. I am a food service, gaming and lodging guy who worked at Saratoga to enjoy and learn, and I learned a lot.

[azeri98]

Handle down 9% this year. Better than I thought with all the turf races moved to dirt
https://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-rac...sed-attendance

[the little guy]

Originally Posted by paulbenny

I am focusing on the racing experience, not the handle or the track condition. my work experience in that area, called customer experience is part of why I feel confident commenting on that aspect of the business. As a result, I do not get into the information regarding the total wagering. It is not the point of the customer based upon what I read. I am a food service, gaming and lodging guy who worked at Saratoga to enjoy and learn, and I learned a lot.

Racing experience? How many days were you here this year? It's about the happiest place you can possibly imagine. This ridiculous internet opinion on Saratoga literally bears zero representation of reality.

[PaceAdvantage]

Yeah, it was just the worst meet ever...they ought to consider just shutting the place down...

https://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-rac...800m-in-handle

The New York Racing Association announced Sept. 4 that the 40-day summer meet at Saratoga Race Course generated more than 1.1 million in paid attendance for the first time since 2018 and nearly $800 million in all-sources handle.

Despite one of the wettest summers in meet history, which forced an unprecedented 65 races off the turf, all-sources handle totaled $799,229,288 with paid attendance continuing its steady climb to 1,105,683. The handle was the third-largest in Saratoga's history while this summer also marked the eighth consecutive season with attendance exceeding 1 million fans (excluding 2020 when fans were not permitted due to the Covid-19 pandemic.)

[PaceAdvantage]

And that guy with the glasses who picked the cold pick 6...he's the worst

[azeri98]

Originally Posted by castaway01

Because synthetic track racing is largely awful from both a handicapping and sporting perspective. Several of the breakdowns this meet have very unfortunately been in high-profile races, but that doesn't mean Saratoga should throw out its whole way of doing business and degrade its quality of racing with a synthetic surface.

Why is it awful from a handicapping and sporting perspective? Is it because its harder for you to pick winners. As far as from a sporting perspective nothing is worse than watching 2 really good horses, maybe could have been great ones have catastrophic breakdowns near the wire

[ScottJ]

Originally Posted by azeri98

Handle down 9% this year. Better than I thought with all the turf races moved to dirt
https://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-rac...sed-attendance

Interesting to look at the handle numbers over the last four attended seasons.

2019 = $705M (Note : All Time Record Pre-Pandemic)
2021 = $815M
2022 = $878M
2023 = $799M

Compared to 2022, Saratoga hosted 7 less total races, 59 fewer turf races, along with 10+ inches of rain. Still, they had their their third highest handle in history with record on-track attendance.

Is it the Saratoga Live show actually generating fans post-pandemic? Is it the experience of going back in time to Saratoga Town? Is it the upscale dining and nightlife experience post-races? Is it being held as the top thoroughbred gamble by the bettors? How strongly correlated are all of these factors?

Somehow, despite the meet's issues which have been well documented, the business was strong and the headwinds did not drive people from the game.

Certainly, it seems that pricing elements that were complaints prior to the season (admission, hotels, meals) were not the deterents that some had forecast.

The engine that is Saratoga kept running strongly this season. None of us should take that for granted, ever; it is simply one of a kind.

[paulbenny]

Any points I have made regarding Saratoga are focused on the overall customer experience, on track in general and are not related to handle or the success or failure of people who bet and their selections.

A customer noted the track started early on the last day of the meeting, and my feedback was regarding that particular situation.

My more global opinion is that Saratoga is the engine that drives NYRA, and NYRA is not a public company, and its goals and objectives are not the same as a publicly traded company. The profit motive is different in a public company. It is a fact. NYRA could not survive without the casino revenue and other state actions that allowed it to have three brick and mortar venues. If it was private, things would have moved quicker on consolidation of brick and mortar. The shareholders would have been more active perhaps, and moreover the math would have been profound to move quicker than dragging this out for a long time to the detriment of the shareholders.

Kentucky is still the cradle of horse racing in the United States and will be for the foreseeable future as difficult as that may be for people who talk about Saratoga etc. Saratoga is over now, and now we have the misnamed Belmont at Aqueduct. Even I get confused on that.