Belmont spring meet daily average handle rises but total meet handle declines
Average daily handle was up but all-sources handle was down at the 2022 Belmont spring/summer meet compared to last year.
With 44 days of racing - and 35 fewer races - this year compared to 48 days in 2021, all-sources handle was $591,250,409, down 6.4 percent from last year’s figure of $632,208,251. The average daily handle was $13,437,509, a 2 percent increase over last year’s daily average of $13,171,005.
Average field size for the 419 races run this year was 7.40, down from 7.69 in 454 races in 2021. This meet there were 186 races run on turf and 26 scheduled for turf that were rained off to the main track. Last year there were 211 races on turf, 33 rained off.
Handle for the 2022 Belmont Stakes card was $98,766,906, down 12.4 percent from last year’s figure of $112,725,278, which was a NYRA record for a non-Triple Crown year.
All-sources handle for last Saturday’s Belmont Derby card was, $26,092,359, a 22.2 percent increase over last year’s corresponding figure of $21,337,573.
Ontrack handle for the 2022 spring/summer meet totaled $57,531,001, an increase of 16.6 percent over the 2021 figure of $49,343,664. In 2021, fans were not allowed on track for the first six cards of the meet, owing to the COVID pandemic, and the crowd for the Belmont Stakes was capped at 11,000.