Tuesday Notes

I got slagged by a Kentucky resident on twitter (who shall remain nameless) for not doing a blog today, so I will oblige. Happy Tuesday!

There was a blog post by a California owner today about owners who spend big bucks at horse sales, with regards to a recent California takeout hike.

•  Didn't we recently ask the players to accept a takeout raise in California?  We claimed the owners needed it to survive and scared them into thinking the game would go away without it.  It was the start of a nationwide push to educate the industry on the plight of the owner.
  
  Then, like watching the Beverly Hills Housewives rush into Saks Fifth Avenue, we went on a spending spree to open the 2YO sales of 2013.
  
  It makes you look foolish to tell your kids you're broke and then go out and buy a Ferrari for yourself.

Not really.

Owning racehorses, especially of a higher caliber in yearling sales, is not about a 10% purse hike, where a MCL race goes from a $22,000 to $24,000 purse. At the high end, return on investment is dismal, and will be dismal if purses were even $100,000 for a MSW. People at the very top buy horses as a hobby along with the thrill to win and attend big races (or cash a lotto ticket on a nice stud deal). They're not saying "no I will only go to $1.7 million on that two year old instead of $1.8 million, because claiming purses are down 4% at Golden Gate". If they bought these horses purely as a business, they'd never buy one in the first place.

Interestingly enough, even the $22k to $24k purse bumps, I feel, don't do very much for the business in real terms either. The purse increase, as we've seen in slots land, can get eaten up by vets and other suppliers raising their prices. In addition, that purse increase may only go to the top stables who win (and new partnerships who are created), while those at the bottom still trudge along. If the bottom end are struggling to win purses before the purse hike, they struggle after as the racing gets more top heavy, with the pursuit of win checks by big stables. And as an added disincentive, their costs go up too. I don't know, maybe they're even worse off.

It doesn't do much for bettors either. Claim and drop horses at 2-5 are in a lot of races at slot tracks with weird purse to claim price ratios, making more and more races unbettable.I don't know how one can maximize purse hikes to do more for the business of racing; I am not that smart. But to think they're the holy grail like some do, I believe, is not reality.

Great news tweeted out by an insider just now:

#RMTC working on biomarker research for shock wave use & even muscoloskeletal injury.
— righthind (@righthind) March 19, 2013

Joe Faraldo, who works in New York racing, wrote an article about New Jersey racing.  I found it rather odd, because I don't think I've ever seen inter-jurisdiction commentary ever done before in the business. Allan over at VFTRG took a look at the release.

Nice article by Caton Bredar on jock changes. Fans look at them as the be all and end all, but most times it's just political, or a "feeling". I remember chatting with a trainer of a big stable who used a particular guy. It wasn't for any earth shattering reason, nor was it numbers based. He just said "I feel I have good luck with him".

Tom LaMarra posted this picture of the old Atlantic City tote board on twitter today. I replied that with horse's odds changing from the quarter pole to the three quarter pole nowadays, the picture is a metaphor.

There's an article about Frog Juice in an Oklahoma paper I found interesting.  People like to say detention barns do nothing to help, but noted in that article is that frog juice is given within six hours of post time, IV. Similarly, I have heard venom given underneath the skin is ineffective four hours or more out. Detention barns still make a difference, in my opinion.

Brian Nadeau on the Xpressbet blog took (what I thought was) a back-swipe at the Pletcher-type trainers out there. He wrote:

• Mott cares much more about developing a horse than getting them cranked to run hard in their first career start, especially going long. 

The Ontario Ombudsmen responded to the letters he's received about the Slots at Racetrack program. he investigated and found things were done correctly. If you read the comments section, people are saying it's a 'fix' and corruption.  The "fix" angle seems to grow, as the reality of the situation takes hold.

Good article about Dresden Raceway by Britt Kennedy on SC.

A lady on twitter named "Lady Longshot" was a staple to many on the medium if you liked horse racing. Most were informed this week that she passed away. She loved racing, was a pleasure to speak with and had a nice way about her.  She struggled with her disease with class and dignity and always looked forward to her next race, bet, or conversation. It's very sad to see her go. May her sweet soul rest in peace.

So How About Some Props for America's Best Racing?

So I was at work awhile back and one of my coworkers was going to lunch at Pizza Hut. I was busy with something so she asked if she could bring me back some takeout. I said sure, but told her that the only pizza I didn't want was one that had green peppers. I hate green peppers.

About 40 minutes or so later she brings me back a green pepper pizza. No pepperoni, no mushrooms, just green peppers. I tried to pick the green peppers off (did I mention I hate green peppers?) but there was still that green pepper residue on the cheese.

That was really annoying.

In racing we're annoyed at plenty, too. Some dude from some track will relentlessly tweet "takeout doesn't matter, jack it up to where Turkey's is". There's the guy in the stewards room who thinks the horse that blindsided mine into the infield pond should be left up. There's the track exec, five minutes after I get my pick 4 ticket in, who decides we "better go off the turf now in the sixth". There are horse's running around without testicles, when the program says they've got a couple, or at least one. And the NYRA apologists, holy moly. If a NYRA exec got caught clubbing a baby seal they'd blame the seal.

The point is, there's plenty of negativity in racing and in many cases it's warranted.

I propose we should suspend such negativity, maybe just this once, for America's Best Racing. No matter how many people try to be negative and critical towards them, the promo arm of the Jockey Club and the NTRA has been doing some pretty nice work.

Source: The dude with the Apple laptop is NOT Sid Fernando

Sure I could nitpick that all of my suggestions for ABR Brand Ambassadors were summarily dismissed for some kinda Hip Hop listening, Red Bull drinking yutes. Maybe that hoof locker thing belongs in the New Coke dust bin, too. But by and large they've been doing a good job.

From promoting the sport on the interwebs by creating a brand new brand and website from scratch, to teaching people how to bet at their ABR tents, to humanizing our participants and promoting the horses, to getting the digitally savvy folks engaged on the twitter, they've been on fire.

That doesn't mean everything they're doing is right, or perfect, and it doesn't mean people can't critique what they've been up to. But for gosh sakes, how about some props for the good work they have done?

The video released today shows that they're trying things, they're working hard and they have a passion for the sport. It's infectious. It's fun. And it's great to see.

From an non-green pepper eating racing curmudgeon like me - who has been around the block far too many times to mention in this sport - accept my props and keep up the good work.

Crowdsourcing Within a Sport

I remember seven or eight years ago I received a purse check from Kawartha Downs. Our horse - I can't remember which one - came second or third in a race and netted (after paying commissions) around $1442. At that time I was on a chat board frequented by many in the sport and asked a question:

"What if my purse check was $1,400 instead, and the other $42 went into something to build the sport of horse racing? I would not miss it that much, would you?"

It wasn't a very popular topic. It seems people really wanted that $42. Unfortunately, Kawartha Downs, in 2013, has announced they are closed down. No more racing, no more purse checks.

I'm not naive enough to think my and others $42 would have saved Kawartha Downs, nor would it have saved horse racing. But I think it might have made some difference.

Last week a long-cancelled TV show called "Veronica Mars" gained some publicity because the fans began giving it money, to produce a feature film. Via a funding start up mechanism called "Kickstarter" fans chipped in $1M in the first four hours and the two million dollar target was hit in one day. This feature film will likely be created. Bravo for them.

Mine and your $42 from the purse check would've been Kickstarter crowd sourced funding, without Kickstarter.

Sticking with the video production theme, our $42 might've created a set of documentaries on great horses and people. We see those the odd time on HRTV or TVG, but there are not enough of them, simply because they are not economically viable. There are hundreds of channels, screaming for content, like an ESPN, Fox Sports, or Biography who might have been interested to produce them along with us (if we fund the effort) and show them to a wider audience.

Our $42 might've crowdsourced a horse racing wiki. Not long ago I typed in "Cam Fella" and the great pacer didn't even have a wikipedia page. How sad is that? Where is horse racings history for people who may be searching for it on the web? It's scattered, disparate, capricious. It's assembled like there is no one minding the horse racing history store.

Our $42 might've supported a series on Game TV or a station similar to promote the art of handicapping, and encourage those to learn, get interested and maybe visit their local track.

Our $42, together, might've done something pretty interesting.

I am sure you're saying some of this has been tried before, with the NTRA or Jockey Club or USTA or Standardbred Canada. In fact, Standardbred Canada with the "Racing Development and Sustainability Plan" (which was rejected by the industry) went to far as to put pen to paper on it. However, these groups were funded with varying missions, with varying stakeholders, with a ton of politics. They were concerned with buying TV time for races, safety alliances, lasix use or not use, lobbying, slots and a million industry-specific other things. They were inside baseball, to a large extent.

Spin offs, like America's Best Racing, or other initiatives have begun, that are more in line with customer, history and end user based metrics, but it's not nearly enough.

The NFL takes cash out of revenues for safety and rule changes and government lobbying and everything else; not dissimilar to the way racing does. But a large portion of their budget is for NFL Films, or NFL.com, or the NFL Network. Some might ask why would they spend so much money on those "tangential" things, considering they're on television every weekend, and get billions to show their games; considering they have ESPN.com and hundreds of other sites providing free commentary and box scores and fantasy results; considering they are already in the fabric of American culture?

I think they continue to spend money on those things because they believe they're in, and have stayed in the fabric of American culture precisely because of that spending. It's not like it is altruistic, either. By feeding the funnel with new fans, along with keeping their existing fan based engaged and satisfied, it allows them to cash in on those $4 billion dollar TV deals down the road.

The next time you watch the NFL RedZone, tune into Gamecenter at NFL.com or watch a documentary on the NFL Network about Tom Landry, remember that these things were created by people, for people, with specific end-users in mind. They weren't about political biases, field safety, helmet safety or how many games the Packers will have at Lambeau next year. They aren't even about hard revenue per user, return on ad spend targets, or selling advertising. They were about you - the home viewer - and about continuing the great sport of football as a part of American life.

$42 out of a purse check seems like a lot of money to a lot of people. But if a few thousand fans can raise a couple of million dollars on a website for a cancelled TV show, I believe racing should be able to blow that away, to fill a void that many who have came before them have neglected. It's something that's long overdue.