Announcer Bill Downes to call Golden Gate winter-spring meet

Bill Downes, the track announcer at Emerald Downs in Washington State earlier this year, has been named the track announcer at Golden Gate Fields for the track’s winter-spring meeting that begins on Dec. 26.

Downes will replace Matt Dinerman, who left Golden Gate Fields after Sunday’s races to become the track announcer at Oaklawn Park, which opens its winter-spring meeting on Dec. 8.

Frank Mirahmadi will call the races at Golden Gate Fields beginning Friday through the end of the track’s current autumn meeting on Dec. 10.

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Dinerman was the announcer at Golden Gate Fields for six years.

“I’ve made a lot of good friends and leaving is not easy,” he said last weekend.

“I worked hard to try and do the best job I could. When you put your heart and soul in the work, leaving makes you feel a little melancholy. It’s a see-ya-later, not goodbye.”

Downes previously called races at tracks in Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

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