JC / Railbird

Santa Anita

Circling Back

Jay Hovdey on Santa Anita’s return to dirt:

So it is ahead to the past — sealed tracks and cracked feet, burned heels and rundowns, strung-out fields shying from sandy kickback — a past in which the inability to deal with the effects of dirt tracks inspired the desperate dive into synthetics in the first place. As usual it will be up to the horses, always the horses, to survive this latest shift in the terrain.

There’s been speculation that, with the new surface, old-fashioned California super speed will make a comeback, but Thoroughbred Times reporter Jeff Lowe tweeted late Friday that, “Baffert said it’s closer to Churchill surface than anything he’s seen in Calif,” which suggests not.

Posted in Racing on December 3, 2010 / Tagged Back to the Future, California, Dirt, Santa Anita, Track Surfaces

Working Around

Production is set to begin October 31 at Santa Anita on “Luck,” complicated by the racetrack surface renovation underway:

All of the changes have forced HBO to break up filming of their episodes and have caused problems in booking certain guest cast members and in working with the series’ directors, Bronchtein said.

In addition, the crew has less days to shoot the early episodes and fewer days to prepare for upcoming ones.

“That just adds pressure to the process,” he said. “It’s really forced us to work extra hard and to be at the top of our game.”

The new track surface is expected to be ready by early December, which is when “Luck” plans to stage races for filming. That’s one way to test the dirt …

How has this tidbit not come up before? Bill Barich, author of “Laughing in the Hills” and “A Fine Place to Daydream,” is part of the writing crew on “Luck” and on the scene at Santa Anita. The handicapper-writer, who had been living in Dublin, told the Irish Times, “If all goes well … this gig, as opposed to my books, may keep me out of the Trail’s End trailer park in Santa Rosa.”

Posted in Media on October 23, 2010 / Tagged Bill Barich, Challenges, Film Production, HBO, Luck, Santa Anita, Track Surfaces, TV

On the Surface

Stan Bergstein in DRF:

And so, as it became apparent that Pro-Ride was not the answer to synthetic success, just as 3M’s Tartan had not been, I realized things had come full circle in racing, as in much of life. First, I had watched Delvin Miller’s dream for a synthetic track implode, and now Richard Shapiro’s as both visions disintegrated with their tracks.

Oh, come on.

At the fall meet midpoint, Keeneland, now in its fourth year with Polytrack, reports on-track handle has increased and that all-sources handle is barely off from 2009. Horseplayers are betting the surface. Breeders’ Cup contenders are prepping over it. The Polytrack is, as Alan pointed out on LATG, “as much of a synthetic surface success story as Santa Anita was a failure.”

But that’s not the story you’ll get, and most certainly not from DRF, which sells products as speed-biased as the old Santa Anita dirt track.

Tangentially related: At the Races blogger Matt Chapman rounds up the likely European contenders for the Breeders’ Cup. He comes up with 24 names, 19 of those for the turf races. If that is indeed the likely contingent, it’ll be off about a third from the number of 2009 European contenders, and I don’t think there’s much argument the return to a main track dirt surface isn’t a factor. Fewer Euros isn’t such a big deal this year, but I keep bringing the subject up because — as suggested most recently by the new Champions’ Day, which is marketing itself as an alternative to Churchill dirt in 2011, and the shift in breeding power to European studs, as discussed by Bill Oppenheim and Sid Fernando — it does seem as though the era of American exceptionalism, vis-a-vis dirt breeding and dirt racing, is passing. We can keep our dirt — at the price that we’ll matter less internationally in the future.

Posted in Racing on October 20, 2010 / Tagged Breeders' Cup, Champions Day, International, Keeneland, Santa Anita, Track Surfaces

The Restoration

The work of replacing Santa Anita’s synthetic surface with dirt has begun:

“We just started to take the synthetic material off today,” Malloy said on Monday. “We’ve had skip loaders out on the track, piling it up and we’ll start hauling it off tomorrow. We anticipate it’ll take about two weeks to remove all of the synthetic material.”

The project is expected to be completed mid- to late-November.

With the return of dirt, owner and CHRB member Jerry Moss predicts:

“It’ll be a rebirth of California racing at the highest form and a successful, happy, nondivisive meet.”

Such optimism. Because, as with injuries, the surface is the only issue?

I realize I’m in the minority, but I’ll miss the Santa Anita synthetic. Although more handicappers caught on during this year’s Kentucky Derby prep season, the synth-to-dirt/SA-to-east angle was a profitable one during its existence. And I didn’t regret the Pro-Ride during the 2008 and 2009 Breeders’ Cup, not after the slop at Monmouth in 2007. There was not one breakdown in those four days, no George Washington to haunt our collective memories.

Elsewhere and unrelated: A short piece on public handicappers for HRF.

Posted in Racing on October 13, 2010 / Tagged Breeders' Cup, California, Dirt, Handicapping, Santa Anita, Synthetics, Track Surfaces