Posts Tagged ‘nascar’

The partnership between former Turfway Park owner Jerry Carroll and Arlington Park boss Dick Duchossois always seemed like a strange one. Okay, they literally see eye to eye, since they share a similar physical stature, and both men were among the earliest proponents in horseracing for tracks to get slot machines or full-scale casinos. But when they joined at the hip to become partners in Kentucky Speedway, a Northern Kentucky car racing track with aspirations of becoming a NASCAR juggernaut, it was the Odd Couple redux.

Duchossois is a world traveler who owns a yacht that might have made Aristotle Onassis jealous. He’s a bigtime entrepreneur with a huge vision that he followed in building a personal empire in Chicago. Carroll is more of a six-pack in a fishing boat on the lake kind of guy who did well bottom feeding when Turfway Park was on the skids, then made a small fortune selling off the excess property for development.

Duchossois (or his company) is now suing Carroll after the latter decided not to pursue any further legal action against NASCAR following a court’s rejection of a lawsuit against the car racing company for cutting Kentucky Speedway out of the loop for a Sprint Cup race.

It’s a partnership that seemed destined to have an unhappy ending, and things have now gone sour. Read the story about the lawsuit here and come back to the Paulick Report to comment on the issue or the two legal combatants.

- Ray Paulick

By Ray Paulick
Horse of the Year won’t be the only racing subject being debated in the coming weeks in the wake of the 26th Breeders’ Cup championships from Santa Anita Park Nov. 6-7. For what it’s worth, if I had a vote in the Eclipse Awards (and I don’t), it would go to Zenyatta as Horse of the Year. I can’t blame anyone for supporting Rachel Alexandra, but I am a believer in the Breeders’ Cup being a key factor in determining  year-end championships, including Horse of the Year. Zenyatta showed up and turned in a performance for the ages. Rachel Alexandra remained in her stall, resting on her own historic achievements from earlier in the year.

Zenyatta and Rachel Alexandra make up the greatest unfulfilled rivalry since…well…Curlin and Big Brown in 2008. If you’re like me, I’ll bet you’re getting tired of these rivalries, the ones that only play out in the mind. I prefer the type settled on the racetrack: Affirmed and Alydar…Sunday Silence and Easy Goer.

The other subject worthy of discussion and debate is the Breeders’ Cup itself. This is year three of the two-day version of this event, one that began in 1984 as an audacious seven-race, $10-million day of racing. It’s now a 14-race smorgasbord that includes more “championship” races than we have championships (as measured by the Eclipse Awards).

The expansion in large part was based, not surprisingly, on money. In 2005, then-Breeders’ Cup president D.G. Van Clief Jr., who was serving in the dual role as commissioner of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, set a goal of $200 million in handle for the event by 2010. Total handle that year (when the event was at Belmont Park) was $124.0 million, and it rose to $140.3 million in 2006 (Churchill Downs was the host site), the last time the Breeders’ Cup was conducted on one day.

The expansion to two days and more races was also designed in part to be more attractive to an international audience of horseplayers. The downside is the dilution effect it has on the entire event. Has victory in a Breeders’ Cup race lost some significance?

The first two-day Breeders’ Cup, held at a very wet Monmouth Park in 2007, yielded a total of $147.2 million in handle, and $155.7 million was bet at the 2008 Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita’s Oak Tree Racing Association meeting. Handle dropped in 2009 to $150.2 million, despite the availability of common-pool wagering for the first time to Betfair’s two-million-plus customers.

Barring some sort of a miracle, the 2010 Breeders’ Cup will fall well short of Van Clief’s stated goal. In fact, it could be argued the event is less successful today from a wagering standpoint than it was 10 years ago in 1999, when it hit $100 million in handle for the first time and was still conducted on a single day.

But should handle (or television ratings, which also are lower today than they were 10 years ago) be the yardstick for success? The expansion from eight to 14 Breeders’ Cup races has broadened participation in the event from a horse owner’s standpoint, and it’s given the breeders who support the program through nominations more chances to recoup the fees they’ve paid over the years.

I wouldn’t pretend to compare the Breeders’ Cup Marathon or Juvenile Fillies Turf or some of the other new races with the Turf or Classic in terms of importance or prestige. Those races aren’t going to produce as much betting turnover, either. But they are races that should attract the best of their division from around the world, and they are interesting betting races for fans (compared to the standard fare of five- or six-horse fields that plague so many top races nowadays). In addition, though the new races have increased the total prize money to $25.5 million, roughly one-third of those new purses are paid for by pre-entry and entry fees.  So in my mind these new races do serve some purpose.

Have Breeders’ Cup officials hit on the perfect formula on how to present the two days? Probably not. There are many who feel stacking all the filly and mare races on Friday (along with the Marathon) is insulting and sexist. There are other options, including putting the newest and least compelling races on Friday and keeping Saturday with the traditional Cup races. They could also consider making Friday all turf racing and Saturday the main track races.

But the real problem with the Breeders’ Cup is not the event itself, or the order in which the races are run. It’s the absence of an understandable, easy-to-follow ranking or eligibility system in the weeks and months leading up to the Cup.

The Win and You’re In qualifying races are a start, but not the end game solution. It also doesn’t help that so many other tracks are hosting live races on the same day as the Breeders’ Cup and, in effect, competing with the championships for wagering dollars. Our industry should take a look at another racing sport that has its biggest event early in the season and has still managed to create an exciting and engaging championship Cup. NASCAR has the Daytona 500, as big an event for NASCAR as the Kentucky Derby is for horse racing, and has managed to create a build up after its early climax with its Chase For The Sprint Cup. In order for horse racing to build itself back to national prominence outside of the first Saturday in May, a similar invention must be instituted with the Breeders’ Cup as the final act.

It’s a challenge to organize a sport that lacks structure and organization, but that’s the challenge the Breeders’ Cup was given through a long-term strategic plan presented to the board of directors earlier this year. For this plan to be fully developed and implemented, it will require the cooperation of not just horsemen, but of racetracks that in years past have been reluctant to work with the Breeders’ Cup. Those tracks have to understand that a healthy and prosperous Breeders’ Cup is in their best interest, just as the Breeders’ Cup has to realize that tracks must be viewed as partners in developing the strategic plan.

Copyright © 2009, The Paulick Report

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Created in 1990 to end the century-old monopoly “Daily Racing Form” held on the acquisition and ownership of North American racing data, Equibase is a joint venture of the Jockey Club and the member tracks of the Thoroughbred Racing Associations of North America. For most of its existence, the “Racing Form” was owned by Walter Annenberg’s Triangle Publications (other products in Triangle included the Philadelphia “Inquirer “ newspaper, “Seventeen” magazine, and “TV Guide,” which at one time had 20 million weekly readers, the biggest circulation of any American publication; suffice to say Triangle was an extremely lucrative business).

Annenberg and his key lieutenants at the “Racing Form”—publisher Mike Sandler and editor Fred Grossman—had a cozy relationship with the racing industry. Racetracks were doing well in the 1970s and 1980s and so was the “Form.” Prices for racing’s only daily newspaper went up regularly (always preceded by a page two news brief about the rising cost of newsprint), but if horseplayers and fans complained, there was really no option for them; attempts by other publishers to collect data and compete with the “Form” were quickly squashed, with help in many cases from the racetracks, who didn’t want to upset the applecart.

But in a surprise move in 1988, Annenberg sold Triangle Publications to Australian publisher Rupert Murdoch for $3.2 billion. The transaction made more than a few people in the racing industry nervous. For the first time, they felt threatened that the new owner of the “Racing Form” might not be quite as benevolent as Walter Annenberg and his father had been. In order for Murdoch and Co. to squeeze profits out of this significant investment, there was the fear that these new owners might hold the industry hostage using the historical and contemporary racing data it acquired as part of the purchase.

Not long thereafter, a plan was hatched for the “industry” to begin collecting its own racing data, and Equibase was formed. There were great pronouncements about how Equibase would be used to serve the racing public, making a day of racing more enjoyable, and help address the sport’s need to expand its fan base.

A new publication, the “Racing Times,” launched in 1991 (and folded one year later), became Equibase’s first customer, and before long most racetracks began using Equibase racing data in past performances published in track programs. They were, in fact, competing with the “Racing Form” with their products.

Then and now, Equibase received a fee for every program sold. That has been one of Equibase’s biggest successes: collecting fees at its information toll gate.

Eventually, even the “Daily Racing Form” (which changed hands several more times after Murdoch’s 1988 purchase) became a customer of Equibase, shutting down its own track and field operations that had set the standard for charting American races.

The means by which the data was collected always seemed a bit crude to me. Whether it was the “Daily Racing Form” crew or Equibase’s employees, the method was the same: someone with a pair of binoculars perched in the press box watches a race and calls out (to another person or sometimes into a tape recorder) the running positions of each horse, including estimated margins, at specific points in a race. As you can imagine, it can often take some time to work through a field of a dozen horses, and by the time the chart caller gets through the field, some horses may have changed positions. The only truly accurate call of a race is a horse’s finishing position, which is taken from the photo finish camera.

In short, charting races is a very inexact science, and it can lead to some very misleading charts and past performances that horseplayers, fans and horse owners believe to be gospel. As a former “Racing Form” employee, I would often see charts of races where a horse was said to be 15 lengths behind the leader with a quarter of a mile to run, and then went on to win. Using the formula of one length equaling approximately one-fifth of a second, that horse, on paper at least, theoretically might run his final quarter mile in less than 22 seconds, a virtual impossibility.

I trust that Equibase’s standards have improved over the years, but the bottom line is the charts and each horse’s position in a race at different “points of call” is little more than an estimate made by the chart caller.

Equibase has been promising for almost 20 years now that it is working toward an automated chart collection process. Early in 1991, I felt like an acquaintance of the Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk when I went out to the Kentucky Horse Park to watch a demonstration of an early chart-collecting system. An Equibase executive cobbled together a microchip processor, some wires, a slow-moving horse and an old Telex machine to show that data could indeed be collected automatically. Of course, getting racetracks to mimic the project with antennas and wires stretched around the racetrack was another thing.

Since then, we’ve seen sports like NASCAR lead the way in global satellite positioning. Trakus, a private company that is not part of the Jockey Club “family of companies,” is the leader in this technology for horse racing. Trakus technology has been in place at Woodbine racecourse in Canada since 2006. Del Mar and Keeneland also use Trakus to give fans a video game-like view of a race. The technology can also be used to automatically chart races and give horseplayers very specific information, such as how far a horse may have traveled during a race (based on how wide a trip he had), and when he demonstrated his fastest and slowest speeds. For some reason, the Jockey Club has not yet embraced this technology.

In between the humorous demo in 1991 and the Trakus installations in 2006, Jockey Club president Alan Marzelli (who is also chairman of Equibase) has promised automated charting of races in the “not too distant future.” In 2002, speaking at the Jockey Club’s annual Round Table, Marzelli said Equibase might be on the verge of revolutionizing how racing information is collected. “We are in the early stages of testing this technology,” Marzelli said, “so we don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves. But we think that we may be close to finding an answer. If so, this new technology will not only provide entirely new ways for handicappers to analyze races, but it will also provide broadcast enhancements and new media applications that will help make televised racing more compelling and open up additional distribution channels for the sport. This is not a fantasy. Other major sports—football, baseball, and NASCAR being three prominent examples—are already enhancing their broadcasts using this technology, and the information generated by it today. At its board meeting earlier this week, the Equibase Management Committee heard about the success of our initial tests conducted at Keeneland in July, and authorized management to conduct further testing later this fall. So stay tuned for further news regarding this exciting initiative later this year.”

Seven years later, the industry is still waiting for that update.

In the meantime, Equibase has been a very successful toll booth, charging horseplayers, fans and horsemen for things that other sports routinely give away at no cost. (I suspect it is a very profitable company, though Equibase’s financials are not made public.)

Granted, horse racing is a very statistically-oriented activity, and the collection of the data costs money. But golf, baseball and football (anyone ever heard of fantasy leagues?), among other sports, are also statistically heavy, and those activities manage to collect and disseminate their data without gouging its fan and customer base.

A baseball fan can go to MLB.com and check out box scores of all Major League Baseball games, not just this week, or this month, but last month or last year, or the year before that. There is no charge to go back and relive those games or to see what happened.

If a racing fan wants to go back more than a few days and see the charts of Rachel Alexandra’s (or any other horse’s) races, they have to pay for that privilege. Equibase’s toll booth is pervasive.

And that’s just the beginning of what Equibase charges for. Over the last 20 years, it has become the new monopoly, replacing the “Daily Racing Form” in that role. But is it as benevolent as the “Form” once was?

Tomorrow, we’ll take a further look at how other sports provide information to their fans at no cost, and compare that to horse racing’s official data company, Equibase.

Copyright © 2009, The Paulick Report

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Do you know an individual or organization who you think we should consider for an upcoming “Good News Friday” feature? Then please e-mail info@paulickreport.com with the name of the individual or organization and a brief description of why you think they should be featured. Additionally, we’d like to thank Rob Whiteley and Liberation Farm for encouraging us to bring to light some of the industry’s positive stories and for sponsoring this exclusive Paulick Report feature.

By Bradford Cummings
Oftentimes, the racing industry loses sight of what is important when trying to market its product. Talk of increased handle, while necessary for the bottom line of racetracks, does not change the public perception and momentum of a sport that has continued a slow and steady slide over the last 20 years. In order to grow this sport, racing needs new fans, not old fans making more bets.
 
So when the ratings came out for the Kentucky Derby and most recently the Preakness Stakes, it was a breath of fresh air and a much-needed shot in the arm for the psyche of racing. The first two legs of the Triple Crown brought in an average of 13.4 million viewers, the most since 1989 when Sunday Silence won both Classics over Easy Goer in a spirited East vs. West rivalry.
 
Individually, the Kentucky Derby brought in 16.3 million viewers with a 9.8 rating and 23 share, up 2.1 million viewers from last year. The Preakness came in at a strong 10.9 million viewers, pulling a 6.8 rating and 16 share. This number was up 3 million viewers from last year’s version with Big Brown easily pulling away from the field.
 
For those not familiar with the television ratings system, the Derby’s 9.8 rating means that 9.8% of all households with televisions were tuned into NBC’s telecast on the first Saturday of May while the 23 share means 23% of all televisions in use watched Mine That Bird pull an unprecedented upset. That means nearly a quarter of all Americans watching television showed an interest in racing’s biggest event.
 
Perhaps most significant was the true lack of a compelling storyline going into the race. Most of the favorites had been sidelined before the Derby, and morning line favorite I Want Revenge was scratched the morning of the race with an injury, leaving what has been proved to be an overrated colt from the Louisiana circuit in Friesan Fire as the betting choice. And while other sports have the ability to build audience throughout the course of a 3 hour game, the fact that a 50-1 shot won the race would have had virtually no effect on the ratings because of how quickly the telecast ends.
 
Much credit must go to NBC, which did an admirable job selling the event throughout the week prior with promos on mainstream mainstays like the Today Show and investing in a solid marketing campaign. The fact a long shot won only added to the mystique of the Derby they so effectively sold.
 
That momentum allowed for the male vs. female storyline to be created with Rachel Alexandra and the unintended positive consequences of media coverage from Mark Allen and Ahmed Zayat’s conspiring to keep her on the sidelines. Proving the old adage there’s no such thing as bad press, the Preakness well out performed every other running this decade except for Smarty Jones in 2004, which brought a 7.7 rating and 23 share.
 
Of course, all of these numbers are irrelevant without some perspective and comparison to other top events in high profile professional U.S. sports. While the Kentucky Derby will not be in the same league as the Super Bowl anytime soon with its 42 rating, racing’s biggest day in 2009 stands incredibly strong with other major championship equivalents.
 
The final game of the NBA Championship from last year, in a matchup of the two most storied franchises in the league, drew only 12.6 million viewers.  The Stanley Cup Playoffs featuring the Detroit Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins never saw more than 6.8 million folks tune in to a game. The Daytona 500, the most prestigious race in NASCAR, was down this year to a modest 15.95 million television fans. Even America’s Pastime peaked with just 15.49 million at home spectators during last year’s final World Series game.

Something the ratings do not take into account is the large number of racing fans who watch and wager on events like the Triple Crown races and Breeders’ Cup at a local track or simulcast site. Kentucky Derby Day is the biggest day of the year at some tracks, and those in attendance are not counted as television viewers.

This ranks the Kentucky Derby as the second most watched professional sporting championship of the last year, a fact few in the industry would have assumed. And the news is actually better than it looks. Wedged in at around 6 p.m. EST and potentially distracted by the dinner bell or an eventful Saturday, a viewer more likely schedules their day around the Derby coverage whereas a typical championship game appears during the primetime hours of 8-11 pm. That coupled with the lack of build up for the average racing fan as evidenced by the paltry ratings of preps like the Florida Derby, Wood Memorial and Santa Anita Derby, means racing has a legitimate opportunity to capture the imagination of the public if marketed correctly.
 
With drug issues and safety concerns being taken seriously, there will be an opening for racing to breeze through. Will we take the opening and shoot through like Mine That Bird’s last to first rally on May 2nd? Will we look at what we have and figure out how to sell this beautiful sport to the masses beyond the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes? Can we turn the Breeders’ Cup into a legitimate championship that builds from January on?
 
The good news is we can.

Liberation Farm celebrates the many horsemen and horsewomen who strive each day to make things better for horses and those who work with them.  To learn more about Liberation Farm, click here.

Previous Good News Friday subjects: Father Chris Clay, The Race for Education, Military Appreciation Day at Keeneland, Kentucky Oaks Pink Out for the Susan G. Komen Foundation, Mary Lee-Butte and the Blue Grass Farms Chaplaincy, Mary Jo Pons and the Radio Reading Network

Copyright © 2009, The Paulick Report

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