Odds On Racing - Harness Racing

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                                          Odds On Moinet
                  a winner at The Meadowlands in 1:55.4

Racinos & Tracks can Both Succeed
New Jersey must allow slot machines at our horse racing tracks to catch up with surrounding state competition or face doing nothing and losing our horsemens' future, open space, farmland and other agriculture jobs, revenue and lands associated with the equine industry.

Gov. Chris Christie formed an independent panel to investigate the pros and cons but the time for talking is over. We must have the New Jersey Sports & Exhibition Authority independently move forward and install and manage the slots at tracks with live racing, with a percentage of that revenue reinvested into purses. This would draw the top-bred racehorses back. Partnerships with the NJSEA, the horsemen and the casinos on slots at racetracks with live racing could have monies divided equally.

Let the horsemen purchase the Meadowlands and Monmouth Park and manage installed slot machines and live racing themselves, giving the state a percentage of revenues.

Christie must step up to the plate and soon. The horsemen and the racetracks need new marketing ideas to get more people to the tracks, such as having a game like bingo played in between races along with live entertainment and family friendly days. Reintroduce the horse to the public. After all, it is the state animal.

Atlantic City wants to reinvent itself as a tourist destination. All sides must meet in the middle. Time is running out. With all the income this would generate, I see a win-win situation for the state, the horsemen and the casinos if they all agree to move forward.

Brooks Brothers Find Trouble
Harness Racing Holds Its Breath
by Andrew Cohen
~this story originally appeared in the on-line Atlantic Monthly

The rubble of body-armor manufacturer David H. Brooks' once formidable empire continues to claim its victims. First it was investors in his body-armor company, DHB Industries, whom he and a co-defendant allegedly defrauded out of approximately $190 million. Now it's an entire industry, the sport of harness racing in North America, which has been left dazed and reeling over the possibility that its biggest and most controversial owners may soon be out of the business.

Brooks and his brother, Jeffrey, evidently own or otherwise control at least 800 Standardbred race horses all over North America (some put the figure closer to 950). Whatever the precise number, it represents an inordinately large percentage of the Continent's entire racing population--perhaps the largest ever owned by a single ownership group at one time. Over the years, racing under stable names like Perfect World Enterprises and Bulletproof Enterprises, Brooks horses have often been at the top of the sport. This past year, for example, Team Brooks won more than $12.5 million--nearly three times more than their closest competitor. The Brooks Brothers (and family) also own some of the best broodmares in the business and several fashionable sires.

They are also, I am told by dozens of industry movers and shakers who asked not to be identified for this piece, among the most odd, unyielding and incomprehensible people ever to participate in a sport that's been around for more than 100 years. So having endured their success for decades, many horsemen and horsewomen--owners, breeders, trainers, drivers, trackmen alike--now are left wondering whether the Brooks family's demise in racing is nigh. If it is, if all those horses have to be sold on the open market, the end of the Brooks dynasty would have enormous ramifications for a sport already struggling to find its place in the 21st century world of gaming and entertainment.

Here's how it's gone down. The seriousness of the charges against David Brooks--counts that could land him 25 years in prison if convicted--ultimately begat a deal brokered between federal prosecutors and defense attorneys which allowed Brooks to remain free on bail pending his trial. As part of David Brooks' bail conditions, Jeffrey Brooks, and perhaps other family members as well, were required to disclose and pledge some of their assets to honor David's commitment. At some point in this timeline (it's still unclear but evidently under investigation) David Brooks allegedly transferred some or all of his ownership interests in the horses to his brother.

Jeffrey Brooks in turn, more recently, has attempted to transfer some of those racing interests to other family members. Just before the David Brooks trial began on Long Island last month, however, prosecutors proved that David Brooks was improperly hiding and/or transferring assets. Scotland Yard, according to prosecutors, saw a Brooks family member allegedly taking millions in cash out of a bank in London in a duffel bag. U.S. District Judge Joanna Seybert quickly revoked David Brooks' bail and sent him to prison during the pendency of his trial. The news about the revocation of the bail, and whatever role, if any, Jeffrey Brooks may have played in it, generated a new round of action on both sides of the Canadian border.

First, the Ontario Racing Commission, from Canada's dominant harness racing jurisdiction, announced that Jeffrey Brooks, and the horse-business he and/or his family operate(d) as Perfect World Enterprise and Bulletproof Enterprises, have had their racing licenses suspended. "All racetracks," the stark decision reads, "are ordered to hold, freeze and maintain all funds, purse accounts or monies related to" the Brooks Brothers' enterprise pending completion of the ORC's investigation. No Brooks Brothers horses have raced since in the province. They've all been scratched.

Just a few hours after the Canadians spoke, the United States Trotting Association chimed in. A staid, conservative group that has overseen the harness industry for about a century, the USTA took a relatively bold step (for it, anyway) Thursday afternoon of declaring it would not accept any transfers in ownership interests in horses from Jeffrey Brooks or anyone in his family pending an ongoing investigation into Bulletproof. Put the emphasis on "ongoing," one source told me last week.

And, indeed, this past Tuesday, the USTA, citing the Ontario action, suspended its membership privileges for all of the Brooks' entities. Now regulators in Pennsylvania, Kentucky and Illinois, among others, are mulling whether to honor those suspensions. New Jersey, which hosts the most important track in America at the Meadowlands in East Rutherford, already has suspended Brooks Brothers' horses from racing there. At Ohio's only harness track now in operation Brooks' horses were scratched Saturday. New York quickly followed. On Wednesday, so did Delaware.

At some point, if the horses cannot race because the Brooks Brothers cannot be licensed, and if the federal government, Canadian authorities, or private creditors of Team Brooks seek to tap into the value of all that horseflesh, harness racing may see its biggest dispersal sale ever. Many folks in harness racing told me privately that they wouldn't shed a tear if the Brooks Brothers were forced out of their sport. But getting from here to there, they worry, won't be a smooth ride.

On Friday, I emailed Jeff Pocaro, an attorney who often represents horsemen and horsewomen in harness racing. I wanted to know if he was involved in a defense to the regulatory action against the Brooks Brothers. Pocaro emailed back to say that while he was an "advisor," he had not been "asked to represent any of the Brooks' family members in Canada or with the USTA" so "it would be inappropriate for me to comment. Sorry about that. Normally I would."

But Pocaro was willing to give me a general quote "as a horse attorney." And in that capacity alone, he wrote that he considered "the Brooks' family suspension detrimental to racing, both short and long term. The suspension changes the level of competition. The Brooks' horses produced record earnings for a stable last year, with many of the horses being made the public's betting favorite. If the suspension continues on a long-term basis, racing fans will have to adjust their handicapping to take into account that there are no Brooks' horses in the race. Sometimes there were two or three Brooks' horses in a stakes race and the entry gave you value when placing a bet.

"And," Pocaro added. "A long term suspension could result in the forced liquidation of the Brooks' horses by creditors to raise capital. With more than 900 horses, a sale would dwarf the last big dispersal by Lana Lobell Farms of Bedminster, NJ, when there was a bankruptcy. With the economy the way it is and purse structures suffering at too many tracks in the US and Canada, it would be a huge fire sale beyond imagination, as harness racing would be hard pressed to absorb so many horses at one time."

An owner, breeder and writer in racing, I was up in Mississauga, Ontario this past weekend for the "Academy Awards of Harness Racing," otherwise known as Standardbred Canada's O'Brien Awards. It's a black-tie affair that honors the Canadian industry's most successful horses and humans. It's great fun. But this year anyway all anyone seemed to be talking about were the Brooks Brothers. So sudden was the regulatory takedown last week that there was a full-page, color advertisement in the night's program from Bulletproof--even though Standardbred Canada was forced at the last minute to scratch Bulletproof entries from consideration for annual divisional honors.

The harness racing folks I spoke to up in Canada and then back home in the states--scores of people--don't think much of Pocaro's logic. Some used the word "absurd;" calling it tantamount to arguing that some crimes are too big to be prosecuted or punished. Not a single person I talked to (and granted I did not talk to everyone) uttered a word of encouragement or support for the Brooks family. Many of them have their own unflattering stories about the family's racing operation and, based upon those stories, were not necessarily surprised to find this day come.

The harness people I spoke with over the weekend told me they aren't worried so much about who is going to buy the Brooks Brothers horses if they are ultimately sold as they are worried about who is going to be feeding those horses today. They aren't worried so much about losing the family from the sport as they are about who is going to pay all of the people who say today that the Brooks racing enterprise owes them money for one service or another.

In the absence of detail from regulators on both sides of the border, the sport's vaunted backstretch rumor mill is operating at a high level. There is loose talk of lawsuits and trustees, of trainers and other contractors banding together to get themselves paid. There is talk of rescuing the horses themselves if they ultimately need it. There is talk but no one seems to know what to do next. There are so many jurisdictions involved, and so many different rules and administrators, and two countries each with their own timing and system of justice. There is no centralized Commissioner's Office; no one to direct a coordinated response.

Which is why, right now, the industry is following the increasingly zany David Brooks trial with an intensity usually reserved for the Hambletonian, the sport's most prestigious race. Horsemen and horsewomen, many of whom live week to week anyway, are watching to see whether new lawsuits or a criminal case rise up against Jeffrey Brooks. They are watching to see how regulators in their own business continue to handle this extraordinary event. They are waiting for someone, anyone, to clear title to those hundreds and hundreds of beautiful horses. The question, these earnest people say, isn't how bad it looks now--but how bad is it likely to get down the trail.

Horsemen see Causes for Decline
Tracks not catering to bettors' convenience
Bill Andrew is doing his part, in word and deed, to save horse racing in Alberta.

"We need to get people back into the game," said Andrew, a harness breeder and owner who is putting up a 40-per-cent ownership in his mare Starring Role, a former two-year-old champion who now races in "open" company. A draw will be made on Saturday with three shares worth 13-1/3 per cent each to be won. No bills to pay, just cheques to collect.

"We need to make wagering simpler," said Andrew, who suggests that instead of triactors and superfectas there should be 50-cent win bets or betting on odd-or even-numbered horses to win.

"And interactive betting. With the technology that is available today, why wouldn't you make bets on your computer, your BlackBerry or whatever while the race is going on, with the odds constantly changing?"

Racing fan Tim Rosnau said he wants a national governing body so that the medication rules are universal from one jurisdiction to another. And while he said Northlands does a good job with free admission and free parking and has a clean, well-maintained facility, he lamented that "Northlands cut out almost all of their promotions and raised all their food prices. Regular customers used to get sent coupons for 50 per cent off food items and 25-cent wings. Not anymore."

Nick Eaves, president and chief operating officer for Woodbine Racetrack in Toronto, said thoroughbred wagering was up seven per cent in 2009 from 2008, but harness wagering was down seven per cent.

"There's too much product and not enough demand for harness racing. We race 240 standardbred cards, compared with 160 thoroughbred dates. The balance is wrong, especially when you have 13 or 14 other tracks racing harness horses close by -- like Flamboro Downs, which has something like 250 harness cards a year."

Eaves also said that the biggest growth area in the racing business has been Internet wagering through Horse Player Interactive.

"It only makes sense. We would love to have people come to the track. After all, there is no substitute for being there. But with the products available today and the reality that people's lives are busier and different, we have to make telephone, Internet and other wireless device wagering easier."

A concern, however, is the thousands of offshore wagering sites where nobody knows how much is being wagered but no tax revenue -- or revenue of any kind -- comes back. Then there is the United Kingdom's Betfair site, which offers a betting exchange that works like a stock market, It isn't legal in Canada but people still, of course, find a way. Betfair, which showed a net profit of $121 million US last year, offers 12-to 15-per-cent rebates because they don't have near the same operational costs as a racetrack.

Jerry Bouma, a former Horse Racing Alberta board member and a well-regarded management consultant whose company has restructured other agricultural industries like Alberta Dairy, Beef and Pork has said several times that while playing slot machines is easy, offers quick action and has a low production cost, horse racing is not well understood, has a low frequency and is very expensive to produce.

George Cuff's report for the Alberta Solicitor General and Public Security, which was highly critical of HRA, had a lot of meat in it:

- - "The trust placed in the development of a new A track in the Balzac area has proven at least thus far to be ill-founded.

- - "The current vision of HRA has not proven to be realistic and may be part of the reason that progressive and necessary changes have yet to be made.

- - "The industry is unlikely to thrive unless more attention and the goodwill of all parties is placed on growing the gaming aspects of the industry which may draw along the live horse racing product as an ancillary benefit.

- - "The rightful role of government in the industry (i. e., regulatory) appears to have been shelved and replaced by one of promoting the industry rather than creating the circumstances which allows the industry to do that for itself.

Other suggestions included:

- - Lowering horse racing's usurious takeout. In Alberta it is 21 per cent, no matter the size of the field. Customers are simply unwilling to pay 20 per cent on five or six possible outcomes.

- - Better marketing, both national and local. The failure to capitalize on Zenyatta's triumph in the Breeders' Cup was a story handed to racing on a silver platter, and the community dropped it. Locally, contacts with the media are few and far between -- often completely nonexistent.

- - A one-hour weekly race-of-the-week show with all the week's top races and stories from across the globe.

"Sometimes it's almost like Northlands doesn't want you there," said racing fan Rick Herchek. "Especially with simulcasting. They have no idea how to run it. You will be watching a race and all of a sudden the picture will go off, or the sound will go off, and they will put on the post parade of a harness track."

Freehold Increases Purses
Purse money at Freehold Raceway will increase by nearly $4.8 million thanks to an agreement reached with the Standardbred Breeders & Owners Association of New Jersey.

The New Jersey Sports & Exposition Authority has agreed to release the Purse Enhancement Agreement funds which will be disbursed at Freehold, mostly in 2010.

"The extra funding will benefit all classes racing at Freehold," said SBOANJ President Tom Luchento. "The increases will be especially apparent in the higher classes, with a preference for New Jersey-sired, bred or owned horses."

"We are pleased to come to this agreement to provide for an increase to the purse program at Freehold Raceway," said Christopher McErlean, president of PennWood Racing Inc., Freehold's parent company. "I think everyone understands this is a temporary solution and a long term funding and business plan for all segments of racing - racetracks, horsemen, breeders
and our customer base - to survive in New Jersey is necessary and urgently needed. Freehold has expressed its desire to be part of that process before and will reiterate that position again."

Most claiming and condition classes will experience a 30 percent purse increase, effective with the condition sheet issued on February 11. The first program reflecting the purse increase will be contested on Thursday,February 18 [drawn on February 13], with an additional jump in purses
expected in the spring.

All races for New Jersey-sired, bred or owned horses will continue to have a bonus of 25 percent added to the base purse for such races.

The bulk of the funds -- $4.2 million - will be disbursed through February 2011, with a focus on maiden and non-winners of two classes. Future increases will be targeted toward increasing both the quality of races and field size at Freehold. Both Freehold and the SBOANJ will work to ensure
that New Jersey-sired, bred and owned horses benefit from this purse enhancement.

Freehold will employ some of the available funds to introduce new late-closing events which will be announced shortly.