Total betting on the 14 Breeders’ Cup races held Friday and Saturday at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky., was up 0.6 percent compared to last year, when there were 13 official Breeders’ Cup races held at Del Mar in Southern California, according to charts of the races.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Handle on the five Breeders’ Cup races held on a revamped Friday card at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky., was $38.1 million, according to charts of the races, up 21 percent over the handle on four Breeders’ Cup races on the Friday card last year at Del Mar in Southern California.

The New York Stallion Stakes series will double in value next year to $2.3 million due to increased financial support from the New York State Breeding and Development Fund, which controls the state’s purse enrichment program. Each of the 10 races in the series for New York-sired horses will receive a purse increase, but the races for 2-year-olds will benefit the most.

Federal tax-reporting changes implemented in the fall of last year have resulted in a decline of $307 million in the amount of total winning wagers reported to the IRS in the past year, a drop of 82 percent, according to figures released Wednesday by the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, which lobbied for the changes.

Four of the seven head-to-head wagers that Breeders’ Cup will offer during its two-day event on Friday and Saturday will pit U.S.-based horses against European-based horses, according to a roster of the bets released on Wednesday.

The four U.S-based vs. Europe-based head-to-head bets will be offered on the Juvenile Fillies Turf and Juvenile Turf, both scheduled for Friday, and the Filly and Mare Turf and the Mile, scheduled for Saturday.

The Michigan Gaming Control Board has awarded 26 days of live Thoroughbred racing next year to a group that plans to convert a shuttered harness track into a Thoroughbred track, the board said on Wednesday.

The group, which is planning to host racing next year at Sports Creek Raceway near Flint, will need to reach a lease or other contract to use the property “on or before Dec. 1” and fulfill other conditions in order to run the dates, the board said. If the conditions are met, Sports Creek’s operators will also be allowed to begin full-card simulcasting on Jan. 1.

The Kentucky Horse Racing Commission voted narrowly after a five-hour meeting on Tuesday to delay awarding a license to one of three applicants for a harness track and casino in Oak Grove.

The commission approved the deferral on a voice vote, but four commissioners voted against the delay and urged the commission to make a decision at the meeting. Under the approved motion, the commission will meet within the next 30 days to decide the fate of the applicants, but it is likely the decision will be made before Thanksgiving.

Larry Snyder, who ranks as one of the all-time winningest jockeys in North America, died Monday, according to an announcement from Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark. He had been battling cancer. Snyder was 76.

"Racing has lost one of the great ones," said Hall of Fame rider Pat Day. 

“He became a great friend. He certainly was a rider that everybody looked up to. He was a voice for the riders, always looking out for the riders."

LEXINGTON, Ky. – TVG1, the sport’s only dedicated horse racing broadcast channel available on most cable and satellite systems, will telecast races from the Churchill Downs fall meet this year for the first time in a decade, the two companies announced this weekend.

Mountaineer Park in Chester, W.Va., has suspended live racing for the next two weeks due to the diagnosis of at least one case of Legionnaire’s disease among its employees, according to officials with knowledge of the situation.

Mountaineer Park distributed an announcement about a suspension of live racing through Nov. 7 on Saturday evening. The notice claimed the track was suspending operations in order to conduct “some improvements at our racetrack,” but did not specify the improvements.