Bill Nader

The California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) voted 6-0 on Thursday to approve a dates package for the back half of 2024 that will establish the current fairs-meet-only track at Pleasanton as the new crux of a Northern California circuit. The entire state has been trying to come to grips with the looming June 9 closure of Golden Gate Fields, the lone commercial track in the region, and the Mar. 21 vote by the CHRB was viewed as a NorCal racing lifeline by the estimated 250 supporters in attendance. Those very...

A deal that Del Mar has made with a titan of Computer Assisted Wagering (CAW) provides a rare glimpse into the tremendous sway that individual players can wield over track and racing officials, the potentially lopsided economic ramifications of such deals, and the tremendous pressures that California executives are under with competing jurisdictions that enjoy purse subsidies not available in the Golden State. It also turns a spotlight onto a world largely hidden from the public eye-one that industry leaders are generally loathe to discuss publicly, and in which just...

Edited Press Release As California grapples with a budget deficit in the tens of billions of dollars, the horse industry has grown financially for the state over the last five years; responsible for billions of dollars in economic impact and tens of thousands of jobs, according to a report released by the American Horse Council. In 2023, the equine ecosystem provided a total value of $11.6 billion to California's economy and a direct contribution of $6.5 billion to state GDP, according to the report. This marks a significant increase from...

Last June, Pat Cummings, executive director of the National Thoroughbred Alliance and former executive director of the Thoroughbred Idea Foundation, issued a stark warning about the encroaching impacts from Computer Assisted Wagering (CAW) to the men and women trying to forge a living through horse racing in the Golden State. CAW players constitute a small group of mostly anonymous, high-volume gamblers with an outsized impact on the betting markets--including in California--due to their use of sophisticated wagering technologies and the inducements offered to them in the form of attractive rates...

The precarious, up-in-the-air future of California racing and whether or not the state can continue to support two geographic year-round circuits was made no clearer after Thursday's California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) meeting. The 3 1/2-hour session was dominated by discussion of competing North-versus-South plans that both tried to carve a sustainable path forward while underscoring the dire circumstances that face the industry with the June 9 closure of Golden Gate Fields looming like an unavoidable asteroid. Although the CHRB concluded the meeting--which featured testimony that was at times emotional,...

Three directors of the Thoroughbred Owners of California (TOC) have resigned from their positions in protest of the board's co-signature on a proposal to the California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) that would concretize racing operations in South California at the expense, they say, of a potential viable racing circuit in the North. The former directors also claim the proposal was submitted without their prior knowledge. "On January 5th a letter from the TOC and the Southern California racetrack operators was sent to the CHRB requesting the allocation of race dates...

Nearly seventy years ago, Sports Illustrated turf writer, Jim Murray, penned a love-letter to Santa Anita, and its opening day sonata of sun and sport unmatched by any East Coast oval stunned into icy retreat by the "fierce howlings of blue northers spun across finish lines." Santa Anita, Murray wrote, was an "extravagance of beauty." It was also a well-oiled money-spinner. Huge purses lured the best horses to Los Angeles, and the best horses lured the biggest crowds, their pockets brimming with the spoils of a post-war industrial boom transforming...

Although the recently reported purse cuts for the upcoming meets at Golden Gate Fields (25%) and Santa Anita Park (5%) were not on Thursday's official agenda for the monthly California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) meeting, the commission's vice-chairman, Oscar Gonzales, made it clear that the owner of both tracks, 1/ST Racing and Gaming, was going to face some tough questioning on the topic when the CHRB next convenes in January. TDN's Dan Ross had reported Dec. 9 that Golden Gate is overpaid to the horsemen's account by some $3.1 million...

The overnight purses for Golden Gate Fields' final meet are potentially set for a 25% cut due to a longstanding overpayment of the purse account, according to Thoroughbred Owners of California (TOC) president and CEO, Bill Nader. The Bay Area racetrack is scheduled to race from Dec. 26 through June 9, 2024, after which, the facility is set to close permanently. The purse account, said Nader, is overpaid by some $3.1 million. "There's a pretty big overpayment that's been building," said Nader. "They're looking to claw some of it back,...

A panel about racetrack closures in the prime afternoon time slot on the first day of Tuesday's Global Symposium on Racing hosted by the University of Arizona Race Track Industry Program (RTIP) in Tucson had the potential to be a somber and eulogistic affair, but it did yield some interesting back-and-forth when the discussion turned to how the industry might best stem the tide of Thoroughbred venues going dark for good. The topic "Land For Sale. How Will Race Track Closures Impact the Industry's Long-Term Sustainability?" elicited some of the...

The California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) on Thursday approved a calendar that fleshed out the Northern California racing schedule through mid-September 2024. But the initiative still left race-date gaps late in the year that must be addressed both for next season and the future as stakeholders and regulators attempt to realign the circuit in the wake of news that Golden Gate Fields will not be part of the racing landscape beyond next June. Back on July 16, 1/ST Racing, which owns both Santa Anita Park and Golden Gate Fields, announced...

Southern California's racing calendar for 2024 will nearly mirror this year's dates template, with the exception of Del Mar Thoroughbred Club being awarded a fifth week at its fall meet to dovetail with that track's hosting of the Nov. 1-2 Breeders' Cup. But several California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) commissioners who voted in favor of next year's SoCal schedule at the Aug. 17 monthly meeting made it clear those dates allocations were not to be considered a "rubber stamp" approval that couldn't change at some point in the future. That...