BC gets 9,630 early nominees

Owners nominated 9,630 foals to the Breeders' Cup before a special deadline of Aug. 1 that qualified the owners to a 20-percent discount on the nomination fee, according to figures released by Breeders' Cup on Tuesday.

Breeders' Cup established the Aug. 1 deadline earlier this year as an incentive for owners to nominate their foals to the program. Under the program, the nomination fee for foals was reduced from $500 to $400. The fee returns to $500 until Oct. 15, after which the nomination fee rises to $1,500.

Last year, 3,500 foals were nominated to the Breeders' Cup before Aug. 1, when the early deadline was not in place and owners had few incentives to send in payments. In total, 14,602 foals were nominated last year, down 9 percent from the number of foals who were nominated in 2007, according to the organization.

Breeders' Cup officials have estimated that nomination revenue would fall 20 percent this year because of the impact of the recession, which has hit the bloodstock industry particularly hard. A spokesman for the organization, Jim Gluckson, said that Breeders' Cup has not re-evaluated its estimate for the revenue decline in light of the number of foals that were nominated before the Aug. 1 deadline and the impact of the discount.

"We are very happy with the results of the early discount nomination program and the feedback we have received from the industry," Gluckson said. "However, given the uncertainty of the current economy, we are not doing a re-forecast of 2009 revenues at this time."