Horse racing's slow death

While the horse racing industry still has occasional moments of glory, it continues on a gradual descent into mediocrity.

Read Wild Bill's latest column on horse racing's slow death by going to the RX home page at www.therx.com

Charlie

Thanks Bill

And WildBill or any other owner would do the EXACT same thing. Why race when Breeding is Where the $ is?

No-what I think will cause the SLOW death of horse racing is the rebates gamblers get offshore--when they can't get anything even similiar to that in the good-old USA. But once again-who can blame them?

I hate horse racing. I really do. It has 1 great feature. It is a cash cow for the casinos with no risk, making them enough money to help offset any losses they might have on any week.

It is as corrupt as boxing. It has more down time than any sport I know of. It has vig that will take the typical bettors money 4x faster than other sports; in fact most slot machines carry less of a house edge. It has to be the most unhealthy environment out there. Seedy, older men who should be out enjoying their time, rather bunch into smoky environments, and labor over daily race sheets not realizing they have no more chance to win in the long run than Bill Joel has of getting Christy Brinkley, and then dumping her.

Oops. Bad comparison.

and now the questions...

I am not a big numbers/statistics guy (apparently neither is Wild Bill), but then again I didn't write an article claiming the slow death of horse racing. I opened the article fully expecting to read that the overall handle for horseracing was decreasing at an alarming rate. Instead, that is not even mentioned!
Like I said, I am not a big numbers/stats guy, but it seems to me that I heard somewhere that the overall handle for horseracing was increasing, not decreasing. True, I do remember a minuscule drop at Santa Anita this spring(< 1%), but that was more related to the parent company of SA, Magna Entertainment, restricting its signal from several betting sites and the subsequent boycott of SA/Magna by the disgruntled bettors.
And all the time the overall handle of horseracing has been increasing in spite of the losses incurred from the many bettors who bet via the internet and are not included in the pari-mutuel pools. Depending on how this WTO-Antigua-USA ruling pans out, we could see some form of legalization/regulation of internet betting in the future and all those monies/bets now lost to horseracing's pari-mutuel pool would be included. This of course, makes so much sense, in that both the US horseracing undustry would benefit, and the US Govt would gain more tax revenue, that Congress will not take action.
But Wild Bill, you sound more like Chicken Little than a journalist!

the track owner have no one to blame but themselves.instead of working together to fix the problems in racing they sold there souls to simulcast shops ie.otb now these dopes are selling their souls to get slots.another brillant move that has nothing to do with horse racing or attracting new fans.

stew.i hope you are right about legalized internet wagering,but i believe it would have no impacted on horse racing in this country.

Shit Article:
I disagree with the column in general. There are always going to be smaller tracks with inferior products, but there are also minor league baseball teams and independent teams which attract fans as well....Come to Saratoga with me in August, or Del Mar and tell me the sport is dying. There are record crowds at big events and the total wagering is increasing, not decreasing...Another poster speaks of rebates as a negative but I see nothing of the sort. Rebates increases the churn rate and most rebate shops dump into the pools anyway so it is still being funneled to the track...Fezzik, as a gambler who gambles on everything, I can tell you that its easier to make money in horse racing than any other sport. Not even close. The key is picking your spots and finding value. With rebate shops, the vig can be as low as 7% on WPS wagers. Now that's right in line with the best wagering has to offer on other sports including football and baseball...Horse racing is far from dead, it is healthy and the best racing days like the Derby and Breeders Cup Day rival anything else from other sports.

Plenty of old men lose money playing poker as well.
whether poker/horses/slots most of the old people
gamble for social reasons(so it appears to me anyway)get out of the house etc. think of it as Senior citizen daycare.whether they win or lose
a little is irrelevant,it will not change their
social station in life.

i do view rebates as a minor negative,as it
creates a competitive disadvantage for those
who do not obtain a rebate.Perhaps the tracks
themselves can offer a rebate to those who
wager ontrack as an incentive??

For those that believe that offshore bets end up in the parimutual pools here--I have a real cheap bridge for sale!

treehouse i agree with you.but the problem is there are not enough big events and smaller tracks making money to keep racing a float.

I love it, if you don't agree with someone call it "shit". I ought to take the same tact with some posts on here, but have a bit too much class to do that.

Horse racing as an industry is dying. Fields at most tracks are getting dangerously low. Much of that paltry revenue growth is due to simulcasting, which makes track owners a lot less money than revenue brought in the old fashioned way. No horse racing won't disappear completely, a lot of these tracks will close as they should. The industry will contract maybe 30-40% before it regains its health and does it without relying on tax subsidy from slots.

Think of it this way, where would racing be without slots? If purses in many states weren't getting 20% added to them thanks to tax revenues, what would happen to these smaller venues? Do you think 1% growth despite all the money pumped into the purses and all the extra people on-site at tracks thanks to slots or table games is a good result? And look at the bigger venues, they are treading water or losing revenues despite having many more simulcast facilties and online options picking up their signals. These are not signs of a positive industry at all.

DelMar and Saratoga are not the norm.The horseman are not getting there true share with the OTB and offshore, thatis why horse racing is dying . The cost to race a horse tripled in 10 years and the purses have not keep up .It has become a hobby for the rich ,small stables can,t co pete because of the cost

I do get a kick out of people who cannot see the obvious.

Horse racing had been, and likely will continue to die.

Personally, I say let it die. It is a flawed boring sport that consists mostly of down time and offers its bettors the worst value of any sport.

Ditto to hockey. People are in denial. They always want to blame managment for declining revenues/sales. Sometimes the product just sucks.

Back in 1920 I'm sure some company made a darn good buggy whip and marketed it well. It still went out of business, and with good reason.

Defined Benefit Plans, like horse racing, are dieing a slow death. Older practioners keep talking about a revival obvlivious to the fact that people want 401k type plans, and Americans also want to watch and bet on sports with action
and scoring.

Not often corrupt sports with endless breaks, huge house edges and a clientele that is obviously downtrodden.

"Back in 1920 I'm sure some company made a darn good buggy whip and marketed it well. It still went out of business, and with good reason."hey fezzik how long you been stealing lines out of movies and passing them off as your own?for all that dont know fezzik lifted that qoute above from the film other peoples money,starring danny devito.

wildbill


weather someone rates your article good or bad you should not be offended. you did your job and its causing a stirring amongst the men and women in here good job.

VAULTED-TREEHOUSE you say it is easier to make money on horses then any other sport out there.Well my friend ,you should write a book you would be a multi-millionare. Me personally I think it is the hardest sport.without a doubt to make money on.It is such a mental grind for me and i see others also, all i know is ask any- one who plays the horses if they made money . 99.8 percent will say no.

for me baseball is favorite to make extra $$$$$$$..

kiDslick

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by oldmantime:
For those that believe that offshore bets end up in the parimutual pools here--I have a real cheap bridge for sale!<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Why on earth would you post this in this particular thread? No one in this thread intimated that the offshore betting money ended up in the pari-mutuel pools, in fact I stated just the opposite!

the article...AGAIN...
Note to moderators: DO NOT DELETE THIS POST!!!!

While the horse racing industry still has occasional moments of glory, it continues on a gradual descent into mediocrity. Horse people have used every excuse for their fall, but much of the blame really seems self-inflicted. The recent trend of retiring horses at ridiculously young ages might be the worst development yet.
It seems horses have become like boxers. The worst horses get run into the ground by racing three times per month, while the best are raced a few times and then retired. When a star male horse can earn millions in stud fees, one can understand the careful nature of horse owners. However, in their greed, these owners are speeding along the slow death of horse racing itself.
What horse racing needs, above all else, is excitement. The sport needs reasons to get people to watch and wager on races. Nothing creates that more than star horses. Imagine if the top 20 NBA players decided to play in Europe. The NBA would still be high quality and competitive, but no one would watch it. Horse racing isn�t far from this situation.
Big races are still run and top horses emerge each year, but where are the old rivalries? Which horses can people get excited about when they rarely face a challenge? And what races are highly anticipated when few superstar horses are allowed to develop long careers?
The conditions that used to create excitement are long gone thanks to the stud system and the risk aversion to running star horses. I remember a time when John Henry was the standby each year. The horse raced for many years and the public loved him. He didn�t win all his races, but he competed against the best all around the country.
He developed a number of different rivals over his career and people actually looked forward to these races with many wagers at their local track on his races.
It now takes a potential Triple Crown winner to get people to care about a race. When a horse finally does break through and win the Triple Crown, the owners are not likely to enter the Breeders Cup. The owners of Smarty Jones weren�t going to let the horse enter the biggest annual day of racing. He would have retired as a three-year-old with just one last race this summer.
You tell me, how would fans react if LeBron James made it to the NBA, played two seasons and led his team to two championships and then left to play overseas? Unfortunately for horse racing fans, a similar situation is becoming the norm.
Track owners from coast to coast now say if they don�t get slot machines in their establishments they will go out of business. In the long run these people are kidding themselves if they think this will save racing. Yes, it will save race tracks and keep horses running, but only because they have to.
At least half the tracks with slots would quickly stop racing if they were allowed. The states will probably grant that wish at some point when they wake up and realize state taxpayer dollars are essentially subsidizing lousy horse racing. In politically correct terms, part of the slot win is subsidizing the racing purses.
However, in reality, those dollars could easily be converted into tax dollars, racing be damned. In any case, adding slots does nothing to address the fundamental problems of horse racing. The formerly troubled tracks are now viable, but people coming in the doors aren�t playing the races.
Current conditions are simply setting the table for continued mediocrity in the sport. I just wish those in the horse racing industry stopped crying poverty and admit their product needs to die off in many places and improve from within before it will become viable again, without slots.

The biggest rebate shop located in St. Kitts pays a huge fee for the signal and does in fact put that money into the pool...Wild Bill I apologize if I was too critical, but this is the same mindless criticism of racing that I hear constantly. Small tracks have nothing to do with the overall health of the sport. If Penn National and Philly Park go under, horse players will not shed tears....And what kind of nonsense is it to say that Saratoga and Del Mar are not the norm....(That's like saying we shouldn't include the Yankees in any baseball discussion). Try breaking attendence records year after year in upstate NY. Try 120,000 people at the Belmont. It sure seems dead....You wouldn't had a better argument in the mid-90's before simulcasting took off to the stage it is now, and when the Belmont used to draw 30,000 instead of 100,000....Another look at the health of the industry is the Horse sales which have maintained a strong level in the past 6 or 7 years with a slight blip around 2001 for obvious reasons....Again, Wild Bill you are flat out wrong in your argument. I apologize for calling it shit. To me, it looked rushed and without the kind of support needed to further your misguided views of racing. VT

I love horse racing and always will.But it definately ain't what it used to be.