Handle up at Golden Gate, Stockton

Handle at the spring meeting at Golden Gate fields and at the recently concluded San Joaquin County Fair in Stockton, Calif., showed increases over last year.

At the 35-day Golden Gate Fields spring meeting, which ran from April 25 to June 10, all sources handle (including simulcast betting from Golden Gate on other tracks) averaged $4,572,028 per day. That was a 3.2 percent increase over the same 35-day period last year - 28 days at Bay Meadows and 7 at Golden Gate.

Ontrack handle on Golden Gate's live races averaged $2,561,403 per day, an increase of 4.9 percent from last year's spring-early summer dates.

In Stockton, the San Joaquin County Fair benefited from running without an overlap with Bay Meadows to increase its all sources average daily handle (including simulcast betting on other tracks) by 52 percent to $1,849,538. Daily ontrack handle on the fair's races increased 49 percent to $253,328.

Last year, Stockton ran 10 days and overlapped with the Bay Meadows meeting. The 2007 Stockton meet ran from June 14-24.