Texas Racing Commission

High-profile trainer Robertino Diodoro, who is serving a provisional suspension from the Horseracing Integrity and Welfare Unit (HIWU) after the banned substance levothyroxine was found in his barn at Oaklawn Park, has entered a horse for the April 18 card at Lone Star Park. On opening night, he has entered Master of Disguise (Mastery) in a maiden special weight race with a purse of $33,000. Diodoro is eligible to race in Texas because the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority (HISA) does not have jurisdiction in that state. Diodoro did not...

The Texas Racing Commission has approved the dates for the 2024 racing season at Sam Houston Race Park. The 43-day Thoroughbred meeting will open Saturday, Jan. 5, 2024, with a first post of 6:30 p.m. CT on Fridays and at 1 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. The Houston Racing Festival is set for Saturday, Jan. 27 and features five stakes races, including the two biggest races of the year, the $300,000 GIII Houston Ladies' Classic and the $200,000 GIII John B. Connolly Turf. The program will also feature a trio...

GRAND PRAIRIE, TX - A colt by Practical Joke brought $110,000 to top Monday's single-session Texas Thoroughbred Association (TTA) Summer Yearling Sale at Lone Star Park. By the numbers, a total of 175 yearlings sold for $3,240,000. The figures represented a decrease from 2022 when 161 sold for a record $3,416,000 in gross receipts. This term, the average was $18,542, while the median was $11,000 and 77 horses reported not sold. Foster Bridewell, Director of Horse Sales for the TTA, said of the auction, "Three of our top five offerings were...

The horse...inquisitive, sensitive, totally aware, much smarter than you think, fearful, and a creature of habit. When my daughter returns to our family barn after training in Florida for six months, her retired horses greet her with a whinny. An old friend has returned. The horse is a fabric of historical Texas. The horse represents how we all arrived here, and how we survived in the earliest days. Some horses are bred to run--that's their job. All animals need a job and thrive when working. The thoroughbred's instinct is to...

Like rival boxers primped and posturing, proponents of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HISA) and the Texas Racing Commission (TXRC) have taken to their respective corners during the unfolding legal fight over the law and have remained un-budged. At stake is the lucrative business of nationally beaming Texas's simulcast wagering signal. The TXRC initially took the stance that it is legally prohibited from permitting Texan tracks to export their signals. Then at the start of February, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals sent the congressionally amended version of HISA...

If proponents of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HISA) get their wish, July 1 will be a day of cautious celebration-the law's first official birthday, and a time when its drug control program would also be more than a month old, barring any further last-minute legal interventions. In that event, most of the country will be operating under a federal racetrack safety and medication control framework for the first time in the sport's history. Texas almost certainly will not be in on the party. When HISA's racetrack safety program...

On the back of Tuesday's decision in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals denying a motion by the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HISA) Authority for that court to vacate its recent opinion that the law is unconstitutional, the Texas Racing Commission (TXRC) has reopened the door for Texas tracks to beam their signals out-of-state, with Sam Houston set to begin this Friday. Last year, the TXRC argued that it was statutorily barred from joining HISA, and because the enabling federal legislation gave the HISA Authority regulatory jurisdiction over the...

Edited Press Release During Wednesday's meeting of the Texas Racing Commission meeting, Sam Houston Park General Manager Dwight Berube confirmed that the Houston-area track will apply for 43 live race dates in 2023, beginning Jan. 6, 2023. The 2023 Texas live racing schedule will be similar to 2022, as Lone Star Park has already applied for 48 days. While plans for the overall stakes program have not been finalized, the 2023 race meet at Sam Houston will feature the inaugural running of the $100,000 Texas Thoroughbred Association Derby and Oaks...

Any worries that the first day under which horses had to be registered with the Horse Racing Integrity and Safety Authority in order to compete would create chaos were squelched early on in the day Saturday when a number of tracks reported that not a single horse had to be withdrawn from a race due to the new rules. The TDN sent out survey questions to a number of racing officials Saturday to determine how many, if any, horses had to be scratched because either the horses or their owners...

The simmering stand-off between the Texas Racing Commission and the powers behind the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HISA) bubbled higher Monday, when the commission's executive director issued a letter warning Texas will prohibit the import and export of pari-mutuel simulcast signals at its racetracks if the Act goes into effect on July 1 with jurisdictional authority over the state's Thoroughbred racing operations. In the letter, Amy Cook, the Texas Racing Commission's executive director, invokes various statutes in the Interstate Horseracing Act, the Texas Racing Act and the Texas Rules...

Sam Houston Race Park's expanded 50-day Thoroughbred meet will begin next Jan. 6 and will continue through Apr. 9. The dates were approved by the Texas Racing Commission Tuesday. Sam Houston Race Park was granted 46 Thoroughbred days in 2021 and had one of its most successful seasons since it opened in 1994 as the first Class 1 racetrack in Texas. One of the major highlights was its $5.3-million handle for the annual Houston Racing Festival. Sam Houston Race Park also received approval for its annual Quarter Horse racing season....

With Lone Star Park announcing that it will open its stable area May 4 and with Texas Governor Greg Abbott going ahead with aggressive plans to re-open the state's businesses, Texas horsemen have said they are confident that racing will resume shortly at Lone Star Park. And there may even be fans in the stands to greet racing's return. There has been no racing in Texas since Mar. 28, when Sam Houston ended its meet ahead of schedule. The Lone Star meet was set to begin Apr. 16, but the...