Del Mar's Joe Harper to receive Eclipse Award of Merit

Joe Harper, the longtime racing executive whose name is synonymous with Del Mar Thoroughbred Club, the seaside track he has led for 40 years, has been selected to receive the Eclipse Award of Merit, the organizers of the Eclipse Awards announced on Thursday.

Harper, who was brought on as an executive vice president and general manager at Del Mar in 1978 after serving as executive vice president of the Oak Tree Racing Association, has guided the San Diego-area track to a position of prominence in the national racing industry as the West Coast home of top-class summer racing. The track’s opening day has become a regional celebration, and its meet annually attracts the best horses in racing, particularly for the Pacific Classic, a race that was launched in 1990 under Harper’s management.

“I’m certainly honored to be selected for an award that has gone previously to so many exceptional people in our wonderful world of horse racing,” said Harper, who is 75. “But I’d like everyone to know that I am going to accept it on behalf of the incredible employees of Del Mar, who have, for over all the years, been the backbone of our success.”

Harper ceded his role as president of Del Mar earlier this year, but he remains the track’s chief executive. While he did not take a management role at the track until 1978, his first job in racing was as a cinematographer at Del Mar in 1967.

“Under Joe Harper’s leadership, the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club has been one of Thoroughbred racing’s great success stories for many years,” said Alex Waldrop, the president and chief executive officer of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, which is one of three organizations that determine recipients of the Eclipse Award of Merit, considered the sport’s highest honor. “Joe’s acute attention to the customer experience, his ability to assemble an extremely talented management team, and his willingness to adapt to the changes confronting our sport over the years while maintaining the highest standards make him a very worthy recipient of the award.”

While Del Mar has a rich history stretching back to the founding of the track in 1937 by the famous singer and movie star Bing Crosby and his partners, the track’s popularity began to flag in the 1980s and 1990s. Harper oversaw a complete makeover of the track’s fair-style grandstand in 1990, at a cost of $80 million, and then guided changes to the track’s marketing plans in order to attract a younger, more vibrant crowd to the races, a strategy that has borne rich fruit over the past 20 years.

“Joe Harper is the maestro of that summer celebration, the exuberant leader who makes sure every year that Del Mar maintains its special place in racing’s heart,” said the Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert, in a release distributed by the NTRA. “Joe Harper is Del Mar, Del Mar is Joe Harper, and no one deserves the Eclipse Award of Merit more than Joe.”

Harper is well known to horsemen at the track because he has always maintained a visible presence on the track’s frontside and backside. Trainers knew they could approach him in the mornings, often when Harper was astride a pony at the track’s gap for training hours.

“We solved a lot of Del Mar problems before they ever became problems,” Harper said, in the NTRA release.

Harper’s tenure at Del Mar culminated with the track’s first-ever hosting of the two-day Breeders’ Cup event in 2017. The track was widely praised for its efforts to welcome the Breeders’ Cup to the area, joining with the local business community to heavily promote the event.

The award will be presented to Harper at the Eclipse Awards ceremony scheduled for Jan. 24 at Gulfstream Park in Hallandale Beach, Fla.

Harper and his wife of 55 years, Barbara, reside in Del Mar, not far from the track.