But what about us?

I welcome comments from everybody on the current state of our harness racing sport—EVERYBODY!

When some fan brings up their opinion on any issue, I look at it and believe that if one person brings something up for discussion, there are 1,000 more that feel the same way…but won’t sputter a word believing that it will do no good and things will never change.

I spoke to one fan recently and he said, “What good would it do? It’s just not an important enough issue in my life to care that much about it!”

Back in the early 1970’s, I was in the HTA office of Mr. Stanley F. Bergstein at 333 N. MIchigan Avenue in Chicago—yeah, 50 years ago—and Stan, himself, said, pretty much the same thing.

“Harness racing is NOT an important sport,” he said…I couldn’t believe he said that!

He then brought out some HTA surveys showing that harness racing’s effect on our U.S. economy was about 0.0001 percent…and I might have missed one more ‘zero’ in that equation.

Yes, it was important to me but, realistically, I was only one in a statistical equation of 1 in 3,000 in the Chicago area back then or 0.003%, a bit better in Chicago, a hotbed of harness racing back then, than the national number.

I’m sure in many jurisdictions, the equation is ONE in many, many, many thousand, as well!

It was a bit different back then with only Win, Place and Show wagering with a Daily Double and an occasional Quinella spicing up the action a “bit.”

Long-time bettor “Smitty” liked it better, too, recalling, “The pools were solid and not diluted with so many exotic bets offered.”

Today, win wagering is a distant third to Exacta and Trifecta wagering at the vast majority of tracks and a $50 win bet at some tracks can knock a horse down from 8 to 1 to 5 to 1.

So, “Smitty” has a valid point, and the sport may be better off reverting to some of our old, successful ways of the past.

There are three legitimate points-of-view in terms of this “argument.”

The first one is from the racing secretary’s point-of-view and, of course, another is from the horseman’s point of view.

The third one may be the most important point-of-view—from the bettor…but a bettor’s point-of-view really has little weight in this equation—but it should!

The racing secretary has the most thankless job of all because he or she has to try and fill competitive races to satisfy all horsemen (and women, of course.)

While working in the race office for several years, horsemen (and women, of course) were daily visitors asking if something can be done to squeeze a horse in that misses the condition very narrowly.

The standard answer? “I’ll see what I can do!”

Once a condition is written and enough horses are entered fit that condition, the condition cannot be altered—even if another horse is even $1 over the stated condition.

(I always said that that extra, measly $1 was very important on a condition sheet.)

If it’s a shorter field, maybe something can be done…but when one “sneaks in” to get a race to “go,” the other entrants then have a beef about that…and then expect the same courtesy for them down the road.

For example, It can happen in a “NW $3,500 Last 4 Starts and a horse has $3,501 Last 4 Starts (Yes, that one single dollar can make a whole bunch of difference) and it can happen in a NW 2 PM Races that might need another one or two horses to get it to go and the revised might be NW 2 PM Races—Also eligible NW 3 PM Races but NW last 4 Starts…anything to make a race “GO!”

It takes some kind of imagination to get races to fill these days at some tracks and Racing Secretaries are in the line of fire whichever way they turn.

I respect and salute them all!

Horsemen (and women, too, of course) try and keep owners happy and keep the expensive bills for feed, wood shavings, farriers, equipment and “whatever else” pops up paid by getting their horses in where they can win or do well enough with purse money to satisfy the equation of “checks and balances”—meaning the owner would like nothing better than to RECEIVE A CHECK, instead of having to WRITE A CHECK to cover everything.

When conditions are stretched to let a horse in that doesn’t quite fit the conditions, the other entrants and their connections are put at a disadvantage—a monetary disadvantage—and owners tend to put the blame on whoever is in their way!

It’s a very delicate scenario and a difficult one—if not impossible—to keep everyone happy.

“Smitty,” on the other hand, looks at it in a different light.

“When I first got interested in harness racing—in the 1960’s—win pools were the strongest, the place pools next and the show pools the lightest.

“Daily Double pools were very strong and, when they came into play, a Quinella or Exacta here and there were well received back them.

“Trifectas were next—not every race, maybe one or two a night—and, sometimes, say, in the mid-1970’s, we’d close out a program with a Superfecta.”

“In the last race, a riskier bet was OK because the churn factor was over…everybody went home.

“At my age, I’m the last of the frontier but I still enjoy playing as it gives this old man something to do!”

Smitty’s point-of-view is well taken because the riskier a wager, the more money is burned, and the less money is churned.

If a Pick-5 with a guaranteed pool of, say, $50,000 to lure the members of the BDHC (Broken Down Horseplayers Club), and there’s one winner ($37,500) two winners ($18,500) or, even, 50 winners.($750), all the money going to the winners, whether it be the whole pool or anything with “five numbers in it,” is lost to those few winning players who are NOT going to put much it back through the mutuel windows via the many routes offered and those with the losing tickets have less to spend.

How do you think casinos get away with saying “we pay 92% or 94%? The answer is churn, baby, churn.

Let’s take a casino’s advertisement that their payback is 94%, for example.

In a perfect world—which it’s not—with a 6% “hold,” a $100 bill would become $94 after round one…churned into $88…then $83…then $78…then $73…and so on until, either you tired and go home with $50 or churn the whole thing down to z-e-r-o!

While the casinos—in a perfect world again—are taking a “measly” three cents on every 50-cent spin…eventually, they will have all—or most—of your $100, while correctly stating their payout is 94%!!!

Smitty says the riskier the bet, the less churn can happen to sustain handle…and the culprit is the influx of the riskier exotic offerings that can take, in some instances, 70% of the money bet on them off the pay table. (If an exotic pool is $50,000 with a 25% takeout, and you have a big payoff, say, three winners, each gets $12,500 and a whole slew of BDHC members are tearing up tickets and have a lot less money to churn further.

But Smitty goes even further.

Brett Sturman of HRU fame, once again, has written one of his superior articles about making races exciting again.

In his focus was one race north of the border—a $36,000 trotting feature—where not one single horse made a move until they turned for home.

Even announcer Ken Middleton seemed to be stunned by the action—or lack of it—as he made mention of things several times during the race.

“Nobody’s moved a muscle…” “…and they’re almost at the three-quarters.”

Of course, the horse that wrestled the lead early won…and the second best one finished second as they were “one-two” all the way around after the first eight-of-a-mile.

One trainer’s response was published, “No one is required to pull…and why should they? To sacrifice any chance of earning the small prize they are left racing for? The best two horses earned the 1-2 position before the quarter.”

For that one comment, there are bettors—it doesn’t matter if that number if one or 1,000—that have a financial interest in the outcome of the race that are screaming at their driver at their TVs or monitors (like that does any good if your 1,000 miles away)—you know, the ones sitting three, four, five, six, seven and eight—“PULL…PULL…GO…GO…”

We used to call it a “boat race!

When those drivers “GO FOR A RIDE,” they are taking our most valuable need—THE FAN—for a ride…and that ride puts our sport in a bad light.

So, what’s the solution?

Could it have been that HarnessLink’s “FILL IT OR KILL” proposal in a recent Mane Attraction has some merit and the Race Secretary could have accommodated the remaining starters—six of the eight entered—with an event of their own that was more balanced—more competitive?

Smitty would like to see an even playing field between the races…and the bettors!

But how in the “wide, wide, wide world of sports”—OUR SPORT—could this be achieved?

Here’s an idea…

First, eliminate the exotic wagers that are responsible for damaging the “churn factor.“

This second idea comes after further conversation with Smitty, who lamented, “You know, I’m a pretty good handicapper, if I do say so, myself.

“In the days of, first, Sportsman’s Park and, later, Roosevelt Raceway, my handicapping was confined to picking winners but, over the years—and this holds true today—I tried to pick winners, yes, but I looked long and hard to see who might NOT be trying so hard to be in the money—you know, maybe trying to lose a line with some money on it to get into an easier class next time.

“I’m a handicapper that looks for horses that CAN win and the ones that CAN BENEFIT FROM NOT WINNING!

“In the old ‘A-B-C’ days, the racing secretary put the overnight races together and I think they were more competitive.

“Claiming races are competitive because they’re all in for the same price and, if there is some merit to having claiming handicaps if the spread is not a wide one.”

(An example might be a $4,000-$5,000 handicap or an $8,000-$10,000 handicap with post positions determined by the designated claiming price.)

Smitty has another valid point, and here’s his idea to even the playing field—and it won’t be popular with many…but it certainly would even the playing field between the racing and the bettor.

He says, “We have mutuel prices for win, place, show, exacta and trifecta and, of course, all the other exotic bets that drain from those basic win-place-show pools.

“Purses should be paid covering however many horses are involved somewhere in the payoffs and cover the same as the bettor gets…

“If exotics go up to the superfecta, purses would be paid no further than fourth place.

“If you eliminate the pentafectas and stuff like that with payoffs for win, place, show, exacta, trifecta and superfecta, you will eliminate this single file stuff like that race in Canada the other night.

“Show betting is just a couple of percent these days but, if we have new players, it’s OK to keep that.

“You could eliminate the superfectas, too, and just pay purses to the first three in order!”

“Wanna see some action in a race? THAT’S the way to do it!

In past Mane Attraction columns, I have written about the need to pay all participants in a race for putting on the show to help pay the bills associated with our sport, but Smitty has some very valid points.

But as long as harness racing has a left crutch in the form of casinos in some States and a right crutch in the form of the legislatures in some States, nothing will change, and things will continue to deteriorate fan-by-fan.

So, Smitty, sorry to say, your proposal will never happen…BUT IT’S A GREAT IDEA!

May the horse be with you!

by John Berry, for Harnesslink