With great power comes great responsibility, a wise man once told a young, budding superhero — and, just days after the latest Spider-Man movie hit theaters, two great racing powers, the New York Racing Association and Churchill Downs Incorporated announced their bombshell vision of a brand new day in the sport of thoroughbred racing. Advertised as a move…
The results are in. And, from my wholly unscientific, small-sample-size survey, the four-day racing week has a pretty high approval rating, at least from the people most directly involved in the sport. For many years, the New York Racing Association raced six days a week during the summer meet at Saratoga Race Course. Then, in 2019,…
Published Aug. 20, 2024 A few years ago, one of my favorite things on X (it was still Twitter then) was writer Evan F. Moore’s daily “Who y’all mad at today?” post. Sometimes he offered a poll of possible targets of ire, sometimes he let people hammer whoever had irritated them recently. In horse racing,…
On July 24, 2011, a horse named Down Broadway made his racing debut at Belmont Park. A New York-bred that sold for $90,000, the 2-year-old was trained by Rick Schosberg, and he finished third by a length and a half. Over the next 19 months, Down Broadway raced 10 times, his best finish a runner-up…
Long before Matthew DeSantis started working at the New York Racing Association and NYRA Bets as a content producer for their new YouTube channel, he was no stranger to analyzing complex, sometimes contradictory information. While studying political science in college with the goal of becoming a lawyer like his father, he took a class that…
Over the weekend of May 30, amid coast-to-coast protests against racism and police brutality, jockey Kendrick Carmouche couldn’t hold back his feelings any longer. He propped up his phone and spoke from his heart on Instagram Live for nine minutes—roughly the same amount of time Derek Chauvin kept his knee on George Floyd’s neck, leading…
For most of the last 13 years, a few minutes before post time at New York Racing Association tracks, you could invariably find Bruce Johnstone lounging against the rail in the winner’s circle. Looking tanned regardless of the season, he exuded calmness and relaxation, an appearance that belied an alertness to everything from a balky…
A few days ago, I got a message from a Twitter follower that I didn’t know was a racing fan. She said that she’d always been a racing fan and that her sister owns horses, and she’d come up from Brooklyn to Saratoga for the races. She was here on a day on which one…
In early 2017, the New York Racing Association announced that it would pay a $1 million bonus to any Japan-based horse that won this year’s $1.5 million Belmont Stakes. Although Lani’s presence in the three Triple Crown races attracted a good deal of fan interest, particularly given that horse’s quirkiness, the NYRA bonus was about more…
On Sunday morning not long before post time, several dozen protestors gathered on the corner of East and Union Avenues. They held signs decrying the deaths of nine Thoroughbreds here since the meet began on July 22, one reading “Stop Racing Horses to the Grave.” Though the views of most people attending the track are…
Brooklyn Backstretch 