Santa Anita hoping to get that old opening-day excitement back
ARCADIA, Calif. – In a sense, Sunday’s blockbuster program is the first true opening day of a winter meeting at Santa Anita in three years.
For decades, Santa Anita’s opener has held a unique place on the day after Christmas on the Los Angeles sporting calendar. The last two years have not been kind. In 2019, opening day was postponed for 48 hours because of extensive rain on Christmas Day. The rearranged opening day drew an ontrack crowd of 35,085.
Last year, the track was prevented from hosting a large audience because of pandemic crowd restrictions enacted by county officials. The small group in attendance consisted mostly of racing officials, track employees, owners with horses competing, and jockeys and trainers. A limited number of fans were allowed to attend on a daily basis beginning last April for the final three months of that season.
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Sunday, track officials are hoping for a crowd of approximately 25,000. Those in attendance are required to have a Covid-19 vaccination card – with the last dose of vaccine administered before Dec. 12 – or a negative test taken within 72 hours, policies announced earlier this year by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health for large gatherings.
“We fall into the mega-event guidelines for opening day, especially,” track general manager Nate Newby said earlier this week. “We’ll definitely have more than 10,000. That’s the same as the Rams and the Chargers. We have to check vaccination or negative tests within 72 hours outside the gates.”
Newby said track employees “will keep the line moving” to facilitate as smooth of an entrance procedure as possible.
Racegoers must wear masks at all times when not eating and drinking on Sunday, but will not be required to wear masks while outdoors on days with audiences of fewer than 10,000, which will be most days of the season.
Sunday, the action begins at 11 a.m. Pacific with six graded stakes, including three Grade 1 races led by what could be an epic running of the $300,000 Runhappy Malibu Stakes for 3-year-olds at seven furlongs.
Even amid a pandemic, opening day will be met with enthusiasm from ontrack customers and those watching from home. Last year, opening day had a record all-sources handle of $23,003,159.
Strong handle in the last year has led to recent purse increases at Santa Anita, including a 10 percent hike in overnight purses this winter.
This year, there is added demand for racing since there has been no daytime Thoroughbred racing in Southern California since the conclusion of the Los Alamitos December meeting on Dec. 12, and no turf racing on the circuit since the final day of the Del Mar autumn meeting on Nov. 28.
Newby described the recent break in the racing schedule as a “good refresher.”
“We know we’ll start strong with the break,” he said.
With winter being the rainy season in Southern California, Santa Anita officials will have to decide following major rainstorms if the track is safe to race on. According to a California Horse Racing Board policy, tracks must have a unanimous agreement from the track superintendent, racing officials, and jockeys that racing can be conducted safely if the main track is sealed because of excessive rain.
“We’ll play it by ear on rain-soaked days,” Newby said. “We’re at the point we’re not going to take any chances. We’re going to have a long meet.
“If we get rain later in the season and we need to take a day off and not take any chances and protect everything, we will.”
Sunday’s program has six turf races and five dirt races.
The third race, an allowance race with a field of nine, is the first of the meeting at about 6 1/2 furlongs on the hillside turf course. The unique hillside turf course was not used for sprints from the spring of 2019 until October of this year because of a series of racing fatalities in early 2019 that drew widespread attention.
The course was used sparingly during the track’s autumn recent meeting and is likely to be in use once a day on weekends this meet, according to racing secretary Chris Merz.
The third race is the Jay Privman Hall of Fame Purse, honoring the recent induction of the Daily Racing Form correspondent into the National Museum of Racing’s Joe Hirsch Media Roll of Honor.
The season continues through June 19 with an interruption in April. There is no racing scheduled for April 22-24 or April 29, a brief hiatus to allow the turf course to recover from frequent use and give the horse population a break prior to the final weeks of the season.
“There inevitably will be some lulls in a six-month season,” Newby said. “That will reset everything.”
Sunday’s three Grade 1 races are the first of 10 Grade 1s through the season. The $750,000 Runhappy Santa Anita Derby on April 9 is the richest race of the meeting.