Light Bulb

aspradling — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 15:42:00 GMT

A woman from New Jersey, who’ll remain nameless, waited until the fourth race to redeem her coupons for free long-sleeved tee-shirts. At 11:30 am, the lines wound from the top of the stretch to the finish line and back again to one redemption outpost and from Big Red Spring to the far eastern grandstand entrance gate and back again to the second. Then, by 2:30 pm, the wait lasted only 20 minutes.

Caption: People facing right in the same tee-shirt line as people facing left.
Photo: Vic Zast

"I don’t know why I’m waiting on line like this,” the woman from New Jersey complained. “They’re so ugly,” she said, right before turning over a dozen coupons to a woman dispensing the giveaway and scampering off with her arms draped with the complimentary schmatte. “I may have waited an hour and a half,” said Jim Egan of Ballston Spa, “But I got the sizes I wanted. They’re beautiful.” To Egan’s point, the track ran out of the small and large sizes entirely.

Regarding the giveaways, someone at NYRA has his ear to the ground. They are fashionable, gift-worthy and collectible. NYRA used to chintz, leaving off information like the year - a desirable element on wearable items - and sourced useless gadgets to give away like a horse head coffee mug. Then a light bulb went on. Ball caps, umbrellas and beer coolers are far more popular.

The tee-shirts were black with a white and red logo and date on the front and a white running horse on the back. Saratoga’s announced attendance was 58,006 and about 25,000 people stayed to enjoy the sport. A carnival for kids in the backyard, with inflatable slides, climbing walls and jumping gyms, plus clowns and pony rides, gave parents someplace to take children while the old man was betting.

NYRA scheduled 12 races but held only 11. Officials tried to squeeze them all in before the thunderstorms hit by shortening the time between races but couldn’t. Miraculously, the 120th running of the gr. 1 Spinaway Stakes, Race 10, was contested only minutes before a downpour and the 104th gr.3 Saranac, Race 9, was run on the turf, as planned. Brilliant Speed, a son of Dynaformer and, thus, born for the turf, won the Saranac. Grace Hall, the 1A of an entry, won the Spinaway.

There was a photo so close to call in Race 6 that fans held their breaths like kids in a car passing a cemetery. Heart of Destiny, ridden by Edgar Prado, just nipped a fast charging Pianist, tuned to an almost perfect pitch by trainer James Baker. Tom Durkin said, “They’re in the gate,” even though Salsa Mambo was being a wallflower behind it.

Three of the first four finishers in the first race wore white hoods. The one that won didn’t. Former jockey, turned trainer, about to turn jockey again Robbie Davis gave the leg up to his daughter Jackie on Sandyinthesun in the eighth. Her horse beat one horse.

Elton John played through a typhoon at SPAC.

Caption: Jockey Jackie Davis at Saratoga, here from Suffolk Downs to ride for her father.
Photo: Jeff Rosen

Vic Zast is the author of “The History and Art of 25 Travers.” He’s attended the races in Saratoga for 48 straight summers.

Time of Year, Times of Races, Time for Davis

Blood-Horse Staff — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 13:42:00 GMT

The emphasis was on good racing again, the day after the circus left town. Oh, sure, the NYRA marketing team trotted out a nifty cooler tote giveaway to inflate the attendance numbers. But people who love the sport were treated to one of racing secretary P.J. Campo’s better cards – this, with only one day left on the Saratoga docket.

Tomorrow, admission to the grandstand and the clubhouse will be free. Today, people paid to get in. But, in return, there was something to do with your Sunday besides reading about Sarah Palin in the newspaper or doing the last-minute back-to-school shopping at Target. Horse racing can thrive in a market with no other professional sports. Saratoga is proof if it.

The leaves on the trees on the first turn are changing to red and ochre. The grass is all gone where the picnickers have trampled it to dust in the backyard. It hasn’t rained in nearly two weeks, except for a sprinkle or two here and there. Sweet – the taste of vine-ripened tomatoes and freshly-picked corn. One day until September.

There are 330-odd days until the historic track on Union Avenue opens again, however, and for many fans its Opening Day isn’t soon enough. There was worry in the handicappers’ minds, on the other hand, that the Spinaway Stakes (gr. I) winner was coming back for a race too soon. But trainer Steve Klesaris said running Mani Bhavan with only 18 days between starts was a Hobson’s choice.

“I almost had to put the saddle on her the day after she ran,” Klesaris was quoted by the Daily Racing Form writer David Grening. The 2-year-old Storm Boot filly broke on top, as August Rush dwelt, and then repelled a challenge from Jardin. The time was slow. Alan Garcia was aboard. Mani Bhavan has never been headed at any time in her three career starts.

In the co-feature Saranac (gr. III), which immediately preceded the Spinaway, Marlang didn’t exactly stop watches either. The winner of Canada’s Belmont Stakes equivalent – the $500,000 Breeders’ Stakes - went unchallenged from pillar to post for 1 3/16 miles on the Mellon Turf Course in 1:53.10. Jockey Richard Dos Ramos traveled to Saratoga Springs from Toronto this morning, and it wasn’t because he had nothing fast to ride at Woodbine.

Jacqueline Davis, the 21-year-old daughter of retired jockey Robbie Davis, made her professional riding debut in the first race. She’s a member of the first graduating class of Chris McCarron’s Lexington, Kentucky-based North American Racing Academy. McCarron recently was named this year’s recipient of the Joe Palmer Award, presented each year by the National Turf Writers Association for meritorious service.

The track handled about $350,000 less today than yesterday, although the official head count yesterday was about 36,000 fewer than today.

Vic Zast Saratoga Diary : saranac

Light Bulb

Time of Year, Times of Races, Time for Davis