Santa Anita Park and California Thoroughbred racing groups hope less can be more as Golden Gate Fields has been closed in Northern California with the hope of building a sustainable circuit in Southern California.
This plan—or hope—has seen some positive returns, although it's still very early for comparisons. Looking at the big picture, California's challenge, in some respects, is in line with racing nationally where the sport needs to find a way to maintain wagering—as an expression of overall interest—at a time when the number of race dates is declining.
Santa Anita officials recently reported increases in on-track attendance and wagering during the first eight days of racing for the 2024-25 winter-spring meet. The track is averaging 8.08 starters per race, which is up nearly one full starter from the 7.11 average for the first eight race days of the 2023-24 meet. (Field size is a major driver of wagering interest.)
"It's a been a great kickoff to Santa Anita's 90th anniversary," said Santa Anita general manager Nate Newby. "The success is due to considerable stakeholder support and the strong response by the horseplayers to what we've been offering. Owners and trainers have been backing the program by entering their horses, leading to an increase in field size of (about) a horse per race over last season. The horseplayers have answered in kind by embracing the great on-track product as well as the player-friendly modifications to Santa Anita's wagering menu."
As is typical of United States racing, there hasn't been some grand plan to reduce racing throughout the country. Rather, individual tracks and circuits choosing to reduce dates or close tracks have contributed to that trend. (Smaller foal crops and horses-in-training making fewer starts are factors in those racing decisions as efforts are made to maintain field size.)
The reduced racing trend isn't expected to turn around this year. With the closing of Golden Gate Fields and plans for a reduced race schedule in Maryland, the sport is likely to again see fewer race dates in 2025.
In order to maintain and build interest, racing needs to find ways to market itself despite these reductions. Currently the numbers suggest the sport is falling short in this regard.
In 2024 pari-mutuel handle on U.S. races declined 3.35% to $11,265,210,514 when compared with 2023. Not only is racing failing to maintain handle as the number of races is reduced, the 3.35% decline in 2024 outpaced the 2.37% decline in race dates and 2.82% reduction in races.
Unfortunately, racing has rarely been able to maintain interest (expressed here through wagering) when the number of races is reduced. Sports fans stuck at home by the pandemic in 2020 began betting U.S. racing and stuck with it in 2021, pumping more than $12.2 billion into pari-mutuel pools in that latter year. In 2024, nearly a billion dollars ($951 million) had disappeared from those pools when compared with 2021. This 7.8% reduction in wagering is in line with an 8% decline in total races when compared with 2021.
