Beautiful, bucolic Ferndale opens meet

It took less than a minute for owner Allen Aldrich to mention the Humboldt County Fair in Ferndale, Calif., during his speech in January at the Eclipse Awards ceremony. Aldrich was there to accept the award for champion 2-year-old filly She’s a Tiger, whom he owns in partnership.

The tiniest fair on the Northern California circuit, Ferndale begins its meet Friday and runs for two three-day weekends. The involvement of the community and the natural beauty of the area give the meet a special allure to owners and trainers. Aldrich is almost as proud of Steel Blue’s 2011 victory in the Humboldt County Marathon as he is of She’s a Tiger’s Eclipse Award.

“I met my wife at the fair there,” Aldrich said.

“The people are so involved in racing that two weeks. It’s stepping back to when [trainer] Jeff Bonde and I grew up in Pleasanton. We lived for the fair to come around. The local interest is like at Oaklawn Park.”

The Ferndale meet is primarily for low-level claimers. California Authority of Racing Fairs racing secretary Tom Doutrich thinks there are several reasons why the racing should be improved this year: There is no competing meet at Portland Meadows this summer; there will be six days of racing instead of eight as in the past; and there will be an influx of horses from Oregon and Idaho.

Doutrich says between five and 10 trainers are expected to bring horses to the meet for the first time – “The number of trainers is almost as important as the number of horses,” Doutrich said – and the horse population is up over last year.

Purses are the same as for bottom-level races at Golden Gate Fields, which also began a meet on Friday, and Golden Gate has pledged not to run bottom-level races the two weeks Ferndale runs.

Doutrich says the trainer bonuses that have proven popular at Pleasanton and Sacramento are in place for Ferndale. Trainers who run five horses (all breeds) each receive $500, with trainers who run 10 getting $1,000. Ferndale also provides free shavings for bedding.

But Aldrich, for one, doesn’t need much incentive to come to Ferndale.

“The hardest part is to get horsemen to come, but once they come, they come back,” Aldrich said.