The Alameda County Fair in Pleasanton, Calif., will cease operating as a training center on March 25, according to a statement issued Thursday by the California Authority of Racing Fairs, a decision that Southern California racing officials said will lead to higher purses on that circuit in the near future.
According to Bill Nader, president of the Thoroughbred Owners of California, revenue from simulcasting at Northern California venues and account wagering in that part of the state can be devoted to purses in Southern California after the closure of Pleasanton as a training center.
Currently, some of those monies are dedicated to financing stabling at Pleasanton.
Nader said no decisions have been made on how much purses will increase at Del Mar, Los Alamitos, and Santa Anita this year, stating the track and racing executives plan to meet Friday for the first in an expected series of discussions.
Purses at those tracks have fallen in the last two years because of lower-than-expected handle. Santa Anita has a purse overpayment of approximately $6 million, executives have said.
Pleasanton has served as a base for training in Northern California since last June after the permanent closure of Golden Gate Fields that month. Last fall, Pleasanton conducted a 13-week autumn meeting from mid-October to mid-December that failed to meet business expectations, leading to the abandonment of a winter-spring meeting.
Instead, Santa Anita in Southern California began offering a small number of races daily for horses based at Pleasanton, a program that included free shipping for a round-trip of approximately 700 miles.
Earlier this week, CARF announced that it would not seek racing dates at the four county fair meetings it operates in the northern part of the state, a decision that was widely expected in the racing community.
The organization ran summertime meetings in Pleasanton, Sacramento, and Ferndale and an autumn meeting in Fresno. In its statement, CARF cited the money-losing meeting at Pleasanton in the fall as the reason for not proceeding with racing dates this summer and fall. Behind the scenes, there was widespread concern about a shortage of available horses.
A fifth fair meeting, the Sonoma County Fair in Santa Rosa, is not allied with CARF. It is not known whether Santa Rosa will conduct a race meeting this year, although many participants consider that unlikely.
Since the conclusion of the Golden State Racing meeting in December, there has been a steady decline in the number of horses based at Pleasanton.
As recently as last week, there were slightly more than 500 horses based at Pleasanton, according to a person familiar with the inventory, a decline from approximately 700 earlier in January.
On Dec. 31, the racing community was notified by fair officials that training could cease at Pleasanton on March 25 if the number of horses based at the track is less than 500 in late February.
In a statement released Thursday announcing the forthcoming purse increase, the Southern California stabling and vanning committee stated that 478 horses are currently based at Pleasanton, a number likely to rapidly decline in coming weeks.
Some runners are being sent to Southern California, while others are expected to be sent to Emerald Downs in Washington, which opens its barn area in late February in advance of its spring-summer meeting on April 27.
Nader said Thursday that Friday’s meeting is designed to launch conversations about purse increases in Southern California and a formula to reduce purse overpayments at the three tracks.
“They’re going to happen,” Nader said of purse increases. “They’re real. We haven’t come to an agreement.”
Nader said all the meetings at Del Mar, Los Alamitos, and Santa Anita this year will have increased purses as well as the 2025-26 winter-spring meeting at Santa Anita. He said it was unclear when the purse increase will be effective at Santa Anita.
“It will be the first installment of multiple purse increases,” he said. “We’re going to share the upside of a single circuit with owners, trainers, breeders, and all the participants.
“I think every meet will be up by a decent percentage.”
As for the massive purse overpayment, Nader said that will be addressed immediately.
“We can begin repaying that and increase purses to loyal stakeholders who have supported California racing admirably in the last year,” he said.
Lower purses at Southern California tracks have come at a time when venues in Arkansas and Kentucky are offering significantly higher purses and have lured some owners and trainers to move horses out of California.
Prior to the current Santa Anita meeting, the track eliminated 11 stakes and reduced purses for stakes by $1.675 million from the 2023-24 winter-spring meeting.
Track officials said in November that some of those monies were to be redirected to overnight purses, which also sustained some reductions compared to last year.
Del Mar and Los Alamitos also reduced overnight purses at their 2024 meetings.
In Thursday’s announcement, CARF announced the retirement of executive director Larry Swartzlander, who had been with the organization since 2002 and was named executive director in late 2016.
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