Hazel Park opens 36-day meet

When it comes to starting a meet at a Michigan racetrack, what happens in February can often have a ripple effect on what happens in May.

Winters in Michigan can be punishing, but Ladd Biro, Hazel Park Raceway’s director of racing, said an unusually mild season brought more horses out of layoff sooner and kept more horses in training at other tracks, which in turn opened up the pool of horses available early in the meet.

“We had 70-degree days in February, and that actually allowed a fair number of horses to get out, so that helped our entry box,” Biro said. “Two years ago, we started in early May, but it seemed to be light in the entry box. We’re a little heavier this year because of the break in the weather.”

Friday’s card will kick off a 36-day stand at the Detroit-area track through Sept. 2, with races being held Friday and Saturday evenings. First post was moved to 7:20 p.m. Eastern for the majority of this year’s dates, 10 minutes earlier than previous seasons.

Biro said the move was made to help Hazel Park better stand out on the simulcast schedule. He hoped the track would further appeal to bettors by sticking to its advertised post times.

“The thing that I have seen a lot of tracks do, which I’ve never been a big fan of, they’ll list a post time, but the horses don’t actually come out until zero minutes to post,” Biro said. said. “To me, that’s a disservice. If you had to make a run at the restroom, you’re not sure when you can go and you can’t, and then there’s the core gamblers out there looking at the pools.”

While the mild winter helped bring horses to the entry box, the unseasonable climates also presented a new set of challenges to the track’s maintenance crew. The warm weather was paired with heavy winds in the early part of the year, forcing the staff to replace some lost loam. Early reviews of the surface have been positive.

“We’ve been working very hard to keep that track safe, and fortunately, our record has been such that we haven’t had any major incidents on the track,” Biro said. “I’ve had no negative feedback at all from the horsemen, they’re all very positive about the track surface itself.”

In addition to Thoroughbreds, the five-furlong oval also hosts Quarter Horse and Arabian racing. The opening weekend’s Thoroughbred races are comprised entirely of four-furlong sprints, with opportunities to race longer growing as the meet goes on.

Biro said the purse structure will remain similar to last year’s meet, as the state legislature continues to hash out language regarding site-specific simulcast purse pool structures and advance-deposit wagering.

As usual, the meet is highlighted by the Michigan Sire Stakes card on Sept. 2, with six divisions for Michigan-sired runners, each worth an estimated $40,000.

A set of six $25,000 prep stakes for Michigan-breds is scheduled for Aug. 11-12, while a quartet of six-furlong statebred stakes worth $20,000 each will be spread through late June and early July.

The jockey colony will look familiar to followers of Hazel Park’s previous meets, with top two riders Ricardo Barrios and Angel Stanley on multiple mounts during the opening cards. Also receiving assignments on opening weekend are regular riders T.D. Houghton, Wayne Barnett, Alfredo Clemente, Brittany Vanden Berg, Godofredo Laurente, and Kelly Spanabel.

New faces on the list of riders includes Gilberto Santiago from Mountaineer; apprentice Melissa Zajac, who rode at several Midwestern tracks last year; and Cesar Rodriguez, who competed sporadically in Texas.

The list of trainers once again features stalwarts of the state’s program over the past decade, including Shane Spiess, Robert Gorham, James Jackson, Richard Rettele, Felicia Campbell, Jason Uelmen, Bobby Barron, Doug Caraker, and George Iacovacci, Sr.