Saratoga Race Course’s summer meet concluded Monday, bringing a close to a historic summer that started early.
Racing at The Spa began early with a four-day Belmont Stakes festival, with the Test of the Champion run upstate for the first time on June 8th while Belmont Park undergoes a half-a-billion-dollar renovation. The Belmont will return to Saratoga again next year.
It’s not the only alteration on the table.
Spokesman Pat McKenna says NYRA is considering temporarily bringing additional races upstate for the July 4th weekend in 2025.
“What we would be doing as a technical matter is concluding the Belmont at the Big A spring meet here at Saratoga. That’s partly a function of the fact that Labor Day is early as it possibly can be next year, so the idea would be - and again, this is under consideration and discussion, that we’re near a final decision but if you were to run few of these days here at Saratoga, they would then be followed by the opening of the 40-day summer meet on that following Thursday,” said McKenna.
It comes as debate continues over the impact of the June Belmont Stakes.
The weekend drew more than 120,000 racing fans to the region and handle in excess of $125 million broke betting records for a non-Triple Crown year.
Discover Saratoga is Saratoga County’s official tourism promotion agency, and president Darryl Leggieri says organizers are looking to leverage the momentum from this year’s Belmont Stakes into an even bigger version next year.
“I think that we did learn a lot as well and that we want to make sure in our messaging that we are inclusive of our locals in making sure that everyone feels that they’re able to get downtown and get a parking spot and get a reservation at a restaurant. I think a lot of folks thought that there were so many people coming that they wanted to be careful. But as we go into next year, we want to make sure that—there was room for everybody and there was opportunity for everybody to enjoy our destination,” said Leggieri.
City Finance Commissioner Minita Sanghvi reports that the weekend of early racing may not have been the windfall local officials had hoped it would be for the city: before calculating hotel occupancy tax collection, Saratoga Springs is roughly $25,000 in the hole from the weekend.
Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce President Todd Shimkus has a different take.
“The reality is that the Belmont Stakes festival was awesome for us. Not just from the perspective of the PR that we got and the promotion. Not just from the visitors who were here. But, you know, the Belmont on Broadway concert was free, it was a community event. It isn’t about making money all the time, sometimes it’s about just showing your spirit for your community and making sure that the world understands that Saratoga Springs, Saratoga County is an amazing destination for world-class, major events,” said Shimkus.
Shimkus adds that Saratoga Springs’ sales tax collection through July is 8% higher than in 2023, and nearby Saratoga Performing Arts Center’s extended summer concert calendar has also been a boon to the region.
According to the New York Racing Association, the summer meet generated more than $800 million in all-sources wagering and drew more than 1 million fans.
Horse safety was under a microscope this summer and things have improved from 2023.
Only one catastrophic injury was sustained by a horse while racing this summer on Friday. That compares to nine in 2023 and matches national trends as reported by the Horse Racing Integrity and Safety Authority.
HISA was founded in 2020 to establish a unified set of regulations for the racetracks across the United States. Two years later, racing’s first federal regulator’s racetrack safety regulations went into effect, and in May 2023 it implemented an Anti-Doping and Medication Program.
According to HISA, racehorse fatalities have dropped for four consecutive quarters going from 1.48 racing-related equine fatalities per 1,000 starts in the first quarter of 2023 to .78 fatalities per 1,000 starts in the second quarter of 2024.
McKenna says NYRA is committed to increasing safety and embraces HISA’s oversight.
“It is reflected in the decisions we make in regard to track maintenance, with regard to racing surfaces, ensuring that those are safest surfaces possible and both the Saratoga main track and the Oklahoma track have now proven to be two of the safest surfaces anywhere in the country. And again, that is a credit to the hard work of an enormous number of individuals not just here at NYRA but trainers, backstretch workers who are caring for these horses, regulatory veterans, and again, regulators both at HISA and the New York Gaming Commission,” said McKenna.
Racing on the NYRA circuit picks back up September 13th at Aqueduct Racetrack.
