Colonial Downs handles $1.5 million on re-opening day card

Total handle on the opening-day card on Thursday night at Colonial Downs in New Kent, Virginia, was $1.56 million for 10 races offering more than $500,000 in total purses, according to figures provided by the track.

The Thursday night card, beginning at 5 p.m. Eastern, was the first race card held at Colonial Downs since 2014, when the track was shuttered amid an ongoing dispute with horsemen and heavy financial losses for the track’s owner at the time. The track re-opened this year after the state legislature granted the track’s new owners a license to operate slot-machine-like devices at Colonial and at up to 10 off-track betting parlors.

A total of 93 horses ran in the 10 races, for an average of 9.3 horses per race, well above the national average of approximately 7.3 horses per race in the second quarter of this year. Eight of the 10 races were run on either of the track’s two turf courses.

The $156,000 average for each race was approximately half of the $307,919 average handle per race in the U.S. last year. Handle figures are generally far lower on weekdays than on weekends. Colonial’s takeout rates are 16 percent for win, place, and show, and 20 percent for all other bets, not including a daily pick five with a 12 percent takeout rate. On a blended basis, the rates are among the lowest in the country.

Attendance was estimated at 3,200, according to the track. The Colonial Downs grandstand includes a casino floor for its gambling devices, leading to difficulties in estimating how many people are in attendance for racing.

Colonial Downs is scheduled to run 15 live racing dates this year, running on a Thursday-through-Saturday schedule for five weeks. The track plans to distribute an average of $500,000 in purses a day, using funds built up from simulcasting over the past five years while the track was closed. In 2021, subsidies from the gambling devices will kick in.