Yesterday, the California Authority of Racing Fairs voted unanimously to withdraw its application for a Dec-Jun meet at Pleasanton. This effectively means that the efforts to save Northern California racing after Golden Gate Fields was shuttered in June will come to an abrupt end with Pleasanton’s (“Golden State Racing”) final raceday tomorrow.
None of this, of course, is a surprise as the venture reeked of desperation from the word go, and paltry betting numbers – Pleasanton’s handle was 62% less than what the anemic Golden Gate Fields was generating – and slashed purses sealed its fate. As an added bonus, with no home base, the future of the North’s fair circuit is very much in jeopardy. Now we focus on the South – Santa Anita, Del Mar, Los Alamitos – and the inevitable campaign to implement corporate welfare there in the form of slot machines. For today, though, we savor this latest bit – actually quite more than a bit – of progress.
Sean, you lost employment in an industry that exists solely to exploit thousands of sentient beings for entertainment, and in the process abuses, if not downright tortures them, before discarding them by the hundreds in slaughterhouses to meet a horrific end – those that don’t die outright from catastrophic breakdowns, anaphylactic shock from obscene concoctions designed to keep them running one more race for whatever measly amount their connections can squeeze out of them, or the ever mysterious “sudden deaths” of mere babies that occur with truly alarming frequency. Excuse me if I really don’t have any sympathy for you – at least you get to live, unlike the countless helpless horses your industry abused and destroyed.
Sean Kenney, if you faced being euthanized or shipped to a slaughterhouse in Mexico or Canada, then I would be devastated. Since you are a human being, not a horse, I think you will bounce back from being temporarily unemployed as have many other people.
Marie, that`s 1 reason we quit the galloping & grooming of horses. We became tired of having ourselves beat up for lousy pay & many times we were not paid at all! Sean you could find landscaping work much better paying & the customers will appreciate your well done work. We went in that direction > 20 years ago.
December 28 Freehold Race Track closing all operations. Please confirm as well..
Sean- because there’s nothing else you can do?? I’m betting to guess it would be easy to find another job, and most likely at better pay, and better hours, as well as not having your body get completely beat up!
One of the things that might look good on paper is having more horses to fill the race cards at Santa Anita if they use the horses stabled at Pleasanton. This might make sense to those people who don’t give a damn about how this experience will affect the horses themselves.
Hauling horses anywhere for any distance can present its own set of problems. There is the ridiculous amount of money it will cost for the transport vehicle, the insurance required, the fuel costs, the truck drivers and maintenance of the vehicle and any equipment needed. There are any number of things that can go wrong.
Transporting horses from Pleasanton to Santa Anita to race is a ridiculous proposal that will cost money and put an incredible amount of stress on the horses. I’m sure that there are horse van transportation companies ready and able to make a few extra bucks off of the predicament that the die-hard horse-exploiting people in the North and the South are experiencing from a lack of interest in horse racing in California and nationwide.
Look for Santa Anita to shutter its doors next.
The property it sits on is worth way more than the revenue generated by horse racing, and it won’t be long before the Stronachs decide to put it all up for sale.
I used to love California racing and spent many an enjoyable day there before I came to the realization about the horrific conditions suffered by the horses. Now, of course with the first-to-last payoffs, it has gotten so much worse. IMHO, yes, it won’t be too long before you see S.A. shut down permanently. Me, I have zero regrets about quitting this game for good.
-Joe
Just remember people like me now lost a job.
All those items you wrote of Wanda we read of in a couple of the racing newsletters yesterday. So glad to see the economics of racing driven only by Pari-mutuel wagering eliminating this industry. Now there needs to be the elimination of tax / casino subsidies. The general non-racing spectating public needs to become aware of how much $$ is being wasted on this business that should be going to the benefit of all people with better investments in education & health care. How idiotic to train horses several hundred miles away from the actual tracks they will be racing at! Different surfaces, different temps, different humidity, air quality etc. Not to mention the stress of shipping for 12 hours or more down I-5 in heavy traffic for the horses.
They’re wanting millions and millions of dollars in the form of subsidies from a public that DOESN’T support horseracing by Pari-mutuel gambling.
They are whitewashing the injuries to racehorses as well as the killings of racehorses. They’re glossing over everything that makes horse racing despicable. They are boasting that they have the safest safe racing in the industry. Who would know just how phony the California horse racing public relations people are by saying such a thing without following the contents of the Freedom Of Information Act requests reported here?
There is talk of stabling horses at Pleasanton and transporting them 700 miles to race at Santa Anita. I don’t know how that idea is going to fly. I think it is a way to keep most of the owners thinking that they might still have a chance to continue participation in the California horse racing circuit. They can boast that they can be better than, bigger than, more “desirable” than the rest of the nation in purses, etc The truth is that California horse racing is bleeding money. People have shipped horses to Kentucky. Even horseracing’s poster boy for cheating, doping and killing horses has been racing horses in Kentucky since there is more money in purses in Kentucky and since the Kentucky horse racing people no longer treat him (Bob Baffert) like the most undesirable scum that he is.
It would be an atrocity to prop up the horse racing and horse killing in any part of California including Santa Anita, home of the worst and most despicable cheating and lawbreaking trainers, veterinarians, CHRB members in California.