Horse Racing Revival Emerald Opener Rewards 18,423 On West Side For 3-1/2 Lean Years
Summer and the horses debuted together Thursday in an opening day at Emerald Downs that for race fans signaled the end of a 3-1/2-year winter.
The kickoff of 100 days of racing at Emerald Downs - the first racing day in Western Washington since the 1992 closure of Longacres - was by any measure a smash.
The crowd - 18,423 - approached the record high (25,031, set on Aug. 23, 1981) of its storied predecessor, Longacres.
As Emerald Downs president Ron Crockett promised, live thoroughbred racing has returned to Western Washington in style.
The track - its six compact stories rising high above the finish line - runs contrary to old-school racetrack design of long, sweeping grandstands. With formidable Mount Rainier and blue skies as a backdrop, the $82 million track is the battered racing industry putting its best foot forward.
“It’s just a first-class facility,” said trainer Tim McCanna, who grew up in Spokane and now has a ranch near Yakima. “They haven’t skimped a dime on anything. The horsemen, the fans - they’re trying to take care of people.”
McCanna, whose career as an owner and trainer started at his hometown track, Playfair, is one of only eight trainers with the maximum allowed 30 stalls.
He showed why in the fourth race when a chestnut gelding named Sunny Supremo - a 10-1 longshot in the morning line - ran third behind Grandpa Hillis and Bayjoleur.
Two races later, McCanna nailed his first win when 5-2 favorite Cocktails Anyone with Richard Rughe broke her maiden in only her second start for owner Guy Roberts.
A Spokane trainer sprung the biggest surprise on the gigantic crowd.
Rick Lukenbill sent Order Up Molly - third in last year’s Spokane Futurity - out for the eighth, a 6-furlong allowance with a purse of $10,000 - to absolutely no support. The morning line on Order Up Molly was 20-1. The betting public sent the 3-year-old filly off at 47-1.
She fired late under Frank Gonsalves to win, returning $97.60 on a $2 win ticket. With Miss One Bell second, a $2 exacta ticket returned $528.20.
The opening of the $82 million edifice in the Green River Valley 10 miles south of the old Longacres site is the dawning of a long-awaited era.
“It’s been a tough couple of years in Yakima,” McCanna said, referring to three seasons when the center of the state’s racing activity was shifted to the Central Washington Fairgrounds. “We survived but it wasn’t the same. We had 800 people at the races - pretty much the same people every day.”
How many make their way back in the next 99 days is the issue in this revival.
“As far as making a whole lot more money just training horses, it ain’t going to be that big a difference here,” McCanna said. “But the topside is a whole lot better.”
A 100-day season is just the start, McCanna suspects.
“I’m anticipating, to pay for this place, they’ll end up running 8-10 months here, maybe run a split meet with a little bit cheaper horse in the winter. It rains over here but in Yakima we ran when it was 5-below. This race track will take as much rain as you can put on it.”
Where that would put racing in Spokane - live or off-track - is anybody’s guess.
Davenport businessman Don Strate has six horses on the grounds trained by Tim Harder, son of Spokane veterinerian Roger Harder. Tim Harder got off to a tough start when his first entry - Pursuit Cycle - was scratched at the gate prior to the start of the third race.
Strate is among those interested in resuming off-track betting in Spokane. Until Thursday, Playfair was the Spokane-area off-track betting parlor. Officials at both Playfair and Yakima Meadows have refused to accept a 3.5 percent cut in their share of the money they handle. The impasse has cut off Emerald Downs, the state that collects parimutuel tax and the racing industry from two of the state’s major population centers.
Strate stressed the need for Playfair to succeed, both as an on-site and off-track racing venue. But if the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe’s bid to take over the Spokane track fails - and Playfair remains dark, as it is now - Strate said he would continue to look into another site for off-track wagering in Spokane.
“If this thing continues to be a lock with the Crockett organization and the east side, and the Muckelshoots can’t step in and work it out, then we’re going to need a facility (for off-track betting) over there,” said Strate, who with Rusty Warwick owns stakes winner Halo Passer. “There are a few of us looking at trying to put something together.”
Strate added, “I’ll have eight horses over here. If they can’t run here we’ll get them to Playfair later in the year, I hope anyway.”
On a 70-degree day under the shadow of Mount Rainier, organizers of Emerald Downs had, it seems, thought of everything, including the possibility of a too-dry racing surface.
“They’ve got a water truck - it cost like a quarter of a million - that sprays water straight down clear across the track in one trip,” McCanna said. “Right now they’re putting 40 loads a night on it. It’s like the beach. The closer you get to the water the easier it is to walk.”
An appealing innovation is the positioning of the photo in the winner’s enclosure.
“They wheel you around so that Mount Rainier is in every win picture when it’s clear,” McCanna said. “I hope I end up with a few pictures of the mountain.”
Director of racing Grant Holcomb wasted no time putting together full fields and competitive events. The historic first - the $35,000 U.S. Bank Stakes - was won by even-money favorite Strawberry Morn, owned by Aubrey Roberts, a commercial fisherman from Campbell River, British Columbia.
Dave Wilson, down from Hastings Park in Vancouver, rode the inaugural winner.
“It helped when Reasonably Royal was scratched,” Wilson said. “She was the only other speed horse. If she (had) wanted the front she could have had the front. This is the highlight of my life so far, other than my first win ever.”
Surprise winner of the feature - the $60,000-added Auburn Breeders Cup - was 9-year-old Sneakin Jake, a 17-1 shot with Vann Belvoir up that nipped runnerup Final Act and crushed 3-5 favorite Lykatill Hill.
, DataTimes