Remington Park experienced a 7 percent increase in handle during its 67-date 2018 meet, which ended Dec. 16, the Oklahoma City track announced. The average daily handle on Remington’s races from all sources was $1,071,615.

Purses at the meet averaged $247,413 a program, a slight increase over 2017.

Average daily handle at Turfway Park’s recently concluded holiday meet fell almost 5 percent from the figures posted at the corresponding meet in 2017, according to figures released Friday by the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission. The meet ended Monday before the northern Kentucky track’s winter/spring meeting began the following day with the new year.

Total wagering on U.S. races in 2018 was up 3.3 percent from 2017 despite a 2.8 percent decline in the number of races held, according to figures released Friday by Equibase, with betting growth during the year aided by favorable tax-law changes and a generally strong economy.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Dan Kenny, a jack-of-all-trades in the racing industry who was a co-founder of Four Star Sales, died on Dec. 25 at an assisted-living facility in Atlanta, Ga., according to friends. Kenny, who had been diagnosed with dementia three years ago, was 73.

Joe Harper, the longtime racing executive whose name is synonymous with Del Mar Thoroughbred Club, the seaside track he has led for 40 years, has been selected to receive the Eclipse Award of Merit, the organizers of the Eclipse Awards announced on Thursday.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – The Kentucky Court of Appeals has reversed a lower court decision from last year that sent tremors through the racing regulatory community by throwing out the state’s absolute-insurer rule in a case centered on a drug positive for a horse trained by Graham Motion more than three years ago.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Steve Lym, the longtime racing secretary and director of racing at Canada's Woodbine, will move to the United States and take over as the vice president and racing secretary at Santa Anita, the California track announced Saturday afternoon in a press release.

Lym replaces Rick Hammerle, a favorite of the local horsemen, who was relieved of his duties earlier this month.

CYPRESS, Calif. -- Average daily handle at the recently completed eight-day fall Thoroughbred meet at Los Alamitos was down 8.3 percent compared to average handle at the winter meet last year, according to figures from the California Horse Racing Information Management System.

Average handle this year over the two-week meet was $3.85 million, according to CHRIMS, compared to $4.20 million last year over an 11-day meet. Total handle this year for eight days was $30.83 million, compared to $46.25 million last year for the 11 days last year, according to CHRIMS.

The New Jersey Senate on Monday unanimously approved a bill providing $20 million in subsidies annually to the state’s racing industry for the next five years, including $10 million a year for purses at Monmouth Park.

The 40-0 vote signals strongly that the bill will find support in the state’s House, where the bill is expected to be brought to the floor early in 2019. The bill is has been pushed by the state’s racing constituencies and the owner of the Meadowlands, the real estate developer Jeff Gural.

Judd Becker, the trainer and part-owner of a horse that finished first in a stakes race at Canterbury Downs in August, has been suspended 90 days and fined $2,500 after the horse tested positive for cardarine, a substance available at internet pharmacies that has only recently been classified as prohibited in Thoroughbred racing, according to officials.