By Jennie Rees
Flooding along the Ohio River in recent days left the track surfaces at Cincinnati's Belterra Park and Ellis Park in Henderson, KY, largely under water. But trainers have found a way to keep going at the riverside facility that actually houses horses in the winter–Riverside Downs training center.
Riverside Downs, also in Henderson and a three-mile drive across the river and down U.S. 41 from Ellis Park, faced significant flooding after almost six inches of rain fell in a four-day span, including almost three inches this past Saturday. The ground was already saturated from the prior six inches of rain since the beginning of the month, with the Ohio River expected to crest at near-record levels in the Henderson- Evansville area.
The Ohio River is so close to Riverside that Kentucky Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association (HBPA) board member John Hancock said, “We can stand in our barn and watch the barges go by.” But while the Riverside levee has not been breached, the torrential rain late last week caused the training center's infield lake to overflow onto the track.
Hancock said the tight-knit group of trainers, who have more than 60 horses total at Riverside, have found ways to splash through the challenges. With the track straightaways submerged, trainers the past two days have jogged horses on the turns that were above water because of banking. Every stable has jumped into clean-up mode, even as new hurdles arose, he said.
“It's pretty amazing, those guys who are making this work in the worst of circumstances,” said Marty Maline, executive director of the Kentucky HBPA. “They're doing everything they can to ride this out and at the same time be concerned about the safety of their horses and making sure they are cared for properly.”
Hancock, a Kentucky HBPA board member, credits Brandon Bowling, one of three Riverside owners, with preventing an even worse situation by taking his front-loader and building a dam out of stockpiled dirt on Monday, Feb. 26. That makeshift engineering kept water from gushing in through the back gate. With that main entrance already impassable, horsemen used a circuitous gravel access road to get to the barns.
“We'd have had a lot more water inside otherwise,” Hancock, a third-generation owner-trainer from Henderson, said of the dam. “It turned out to be a major plus for us on the backside.”
Horsemen are dealing with seepage developing in some stalls but have kept an upbeat attitude while waiting for the river to crest and start receding.
“Right now everybody is just chilled out,” Hancock said. “Everybody is taking care of their own business, and we take turns monitoring it. We're all working together; everybody in here is really patient.”
“We're making do right now, as long as it doesn't get any worse,” echoed trainer Jeff Barkley. “Our barns are pretty good. But it's definitely an inconvenience getting in and out….Hey, I was in Ellis Park in 1997, and it was a whole lot worse then than it is now. I only had one horse, and I loaded him up and drove my truck and trailer on the levee to the highway to get out.”
Ellis Park and Belterra have no horses on the grounds during the winter. While Belterra's gaming and simulcasting operations have been closed since Feb. 19 because of the river levels, Ellis has remained open in spite of its own flooding of the racetrack and low-lying land in the barn area, as well as between the grandstand and U.S. 41.
Ellis offered horsemen refuge in its barns with higher elevation. Hancock said he appreciated the offer but believes the Riverside horsemen were just as well off staying put.
“It's kind of like this: We're in here as a group, and we're going to do what we have to do,” he said. “We're all taking care of each other. It's a great group in here. We've been through this before, but it's been awhile since it's been this bad. We are blessed that we have the people who own this place to take care of us and help us.”
Riverside Downs has been a winter training facility in recent years for seven to 10 Henderson-based trainers who move there after Ellis Park stabling ends in the fall. It opened as Audubon Raceway in 1955, conducting mainly harness racing, but also briefly Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse racing during its financially-challenged years as a race track.
Much of Belterra was covered with water, including parking lots, the track's turf course and infield and into the barn area. A large stretch of Kellogg Avenue in front of the facility was submerged.
Dave Basler, the executive director of the Ohio HBPA, said the main issues are potential damage to the main track, the clean up and disinfecting the barn area. Basler said he anticipates the purse account to be “negatively impacted” with the loss of more than 10 days of revenue from Belterra's video lottery terminals.
He said he doesn't expect the April 27 start to the live racing season to be impacted. The track, which butts up to the Ohio, was known as River Downs until being rebuilt by its casino owners and renamed Belterra Park in 2013.
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