Dollars & Sense: Lost Race Days Impact Handle

In a year when smoke from forest fires in Canada forced tracks to cancel race days in the spring and excessive heat and thunderstorms contributed to a decline in races in the third quarter, racing most assuredly has been impacted by the weather.

That weather impact stood out in the Thoroughbred Racing Economic Indicators released Oct. 5 by Equibase for the third quarter and the year-to-date.

The 6.68% decline in wagering on United States races in the third quarter to $3.055 billion, compared with the third quarter last year, basically matches the 6.87% decline in races for the quarter to 9,443. The same can be said for the year-to-date numbers, in which wagering is down 4.26% to about $9.13 billion and races are down 4.43% to 24,857.

While there appears to be a readymade reason for the decline in wagering, I think it’s worth mentioning that legal wagering on sports continues to skyrocket this year while average wagering per race day—a stat that accounts for this year’s reduction in racing—is up just 0.61%.

Because of the reduction in races this year, total purses are flat—up just 0.29% to $947,936,563. As those total purses have kept pace despite the decline in total races, the average (paid) purses per race day are up about 10% to $322,484.

As for the lost days of racing this year, I think as an outdoor sport racing will continue to be vulnerable in this changing world. While there’s little racing can do about canceled days, I think moves such as Gulfstream Park‘s adding a synthetic surface to serve as an option for off-the-turf races makes sense.

In the Dec. 12, 2020 issue of BloodHorse I offered a story on how extreme weather was impacting racing throughout the U.S. It’s safe to say nothing has changed in the years since that story. It is documented that since 2017, four of the five costliest hurricanes in the U.S. had damaged tracks. Publicly traded companies that own tracks, such as Boyd Gaming and Churchill Downs Inc., note the risk in their annual reports.