Golden Gate opens meet with accent on safety

Just like at its sister track Santa Anita, stricter safety protocols for horses are being implemented at the 28-day Golden Gate Fields summer meeting, which opens Thursday and continues through Sept. 29.

Track owner The Stronach Group has upped the safety measures as a result of the series of equine deaths at the recent Santa Anita meeting.

Among the protocols is a pre-race review of starters by a group of California Horse Racing Board veterinarians and stewards, which has the right to scratch a horse it deems unfit to race.

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Golden Gate officials understand it may take a little while for horsemen and management to adjust to the new protocols, but note that everyone wants to eliminate as many horse deaths as possible.

“There’s lots of eyes on us,” said David Duggan, Golden Gate’s vice president and general manager.

“In the long term, we’re doing the right thing. When you implement change, it’s not going to be embraced universally.”

Shortly before the end of the Santa Anita meet and after Golden Gate had closed its long winter-spring meeting, The Stronach Group banned trainer Jerry Hollendorfer from its tracks because of several fatalities from his barn. Citing ongoing litigation, Duggan said he could offer no comment on Hollendorfer’s status at Golden Gate for the short summer meeting. Hollendorfer did win a court order that allows him to stable runners at Del Mar until his case is heard in court, and he also stabled horses at the Northern California fairs. Hollendorfer is the winningest trainer in the history of Golden Gate Fields.

Though the meeting is short, racing secretary Patrick Mackey sees it as the beginning of a new season, continuing with the fall meet, which begins Oct. 17, and then the long winter-spring meet, which begins Dec. 26.

Golden Gate runs Thursday-Sunday most weeks of the summer meet. During the first week of September, Golden Gate races on Monday, Labor Day, then Friday-Sunday. First post is 1:45 p.m. Pacific.

Among changes to the facility are a new safety rail around the turf course and a change in surface in the paddock. The old surface would get warm and stress horses before the race.

The summer meet will offer only one stakes, the $50,000 Rolling Green at 1 1/16 miles on the turf on Labor Day. Entries for opening day were to be taken Monday.