Kentucky Downs, Churchill amend dates applications to avoid overlap

Kentucky Downs in Franklin, Ky., and Churchill Downs in Louisville have submitted to the state racing commission amended 2016 dates applications that avoid overlaps in September as part of an overall agreement on live race dates in the fall, according to representatives of both tracks.

Under the agreement, Kentucky Downs has asked state regulators to approve five dates in the first half of September for live racing – on Sept. 3, 8, 10, 11, and 15 – according to Kentucky Downs President Corey Johnsen. Churchill has asked for 11 live racing dates, beginning Sept. 16 and running through Oct. 2, with racing conducted Sept. 16-18, Sept. 22-25, and Sept. 29-Oct. 2, according to the track’s senior vice president of racing communications, John Asher.

On Sept. 3, the Saturday prior to Labor Day, Kentucky Downs would be the only track running live in the state, Johnsen said, after Ellis Park in western Kentucky agreed to go dark that day. Ellis then would run on its own Sept. 4. and Sept. 5 (Labor Day), the track’s closing day.

The Kentucky Horse Racing Commission is expected to consider dates requests for all tracks Monday. By statute, dates must be awarded by Nov. 1.

Kentucky Downs and Churchill Downs submitted the amended applications after a committee of the racing commission asked tracks to work out their differences over the fall schedule for dates next year. Following the dates committee meeting, which took place in early October, the chairman of the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission urged the tracks to work out a solution among themselves and warned that the commission would approve its own plan if an agreement was not reached by the Monday meeting.

“It looks like we’ve got a solution here that everyone can be happy with it,” said Asher.

Kentucky Downs initially had asked for seven dates in September next year, running through Sept. 29, but Churchill Downs and Keeneland both objected to the dates request and asked the commission to consider forcing Kentucky Downs to run in August. Churchill had asked for 12 dates on a Friday-Sunday schedule, but track officials also said they would be open to running Thursdays during the month if the cards did not overlap with live racing at Kentucky Downs.

“It’s important to us that we do our best to arrive at a plan that is acceptable to all parties, and I think we’ve done that,” said Johnsen.

Kentucky Downs runs a brief all-turf meet each year for which subsidies from slot machine-like devices at the track have boosted average daily purse distribution to nearly $1 million a day, a record for U.S. tracks. The track usually attracts enormous fields and has gotten high marks from horseplayer groups for the quality of its betting product.

The squabble between Churchill and Kentucky Downs over September dates has erupted twice in the past two years. This year, Keeneland joined Churchill in lodging specific objections to Kentucky Downs’s dates request, citing the track’s move to run dates later and later in the month, thereby encroaching on the start of the Keeneland meet.