Track expands programs following San Luis Rey Downs fire

CYPRESS, Calif. – Los Alamitos will expand its racing program on some days this week after cancelling a program last Friday because of the wildfire that struck San Luis Rey Downs in Bonsall, Calif., on Dec. 7.

The track added a race to its Thursday program, making for a nine-race program beginning at 12:30 p.m. Pacific, a half-hour earlier than normal for a weekday. An eight-race program will be held Friday beginning at 12:30 p.m.

There are 10-race programs scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, starting at noon. Sunday is the final day of the autumn meeting.

The Thoroughbred programs must be completed well before sunset since the turn of the racetrack is not lit. The five-eighths-mile oval used for lower-level Thoroughbred races at night is fully lit, but the lights do not entirely cover the one-mile oval for daytime Thoroughbred racing, built in the winter of 2013-14.

Five of the eight canceled races from last Friday were carded for Thursday. Two more races from last Friday were reintroduced for this Friday, according to racing secretary Bob Moreno.

“What we wanted to do is to give everybody [who] had races on Friday that were canceled a chance to run,” track vice-president Jack Liebau said.

“That was a tragic day for everybody.”

The California Horse Racing Board announced Saturday that 46 horses perished in the fire.

Moreno said the expected absence of the San Luis Rey Downs-based horses from the entries could affect field sizes this weekend at Los Alamitos and at the start of the Santa Anita winter meeting Dec. 26.

“San Luis Rey gave us six or seven horses a day,” he said.

Thursday’s program has 70 entries in nine races. There are 56 horses entered in eight races Friday.

Thursday’s program begins with a pick six carryover of $33,841 from Sunday.

Liebau said the track has approximately 190 stalls that can be used for horses displaced by the San Luis Rey fire. San Luis Rey Downs had approximately 450 horses on the property when the fire occurred. Most of those horses have been moved to Del Mar.

Liebau said Thoroughbred trainers based at Los Alamitos “have been receptive and understanding” that they may need to move their horses within the barn area to accommodate colleagues from San Luis Rey Downs needing stall space.

Liebau said there are 119 “scattered stalls” available and another 75 stalls that were used for a recent Quarter Horse sale that can be used, if necessary.