August, 2023 | Horse Racing Free Tips

Arizona Horsemen Looking For Other Solutions As Turf Paradise Future Remains Uncertain

Horsemen in Arizona are still awaiting final word on the future of the upcoming and future racing seasons as organizers scramble to get winter dates in place.

Earlier this year, reports surfaced that Turf Paradise, which normally runs winter-spring dates in the state, was being sold. In late July, the news broke that the Phoenix track would not open as usual in November.

During a meeting of the Arizona Racing Commission on Aug. 10, officials with Arizona Downs in Prescott Valley and the Arizona Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association revealed they had been in discussions to shift dates from Turf Paradise to Arizona Downs. Arizona Downs did not apply for 2023 racing dates by the deadline this year, and rumors had indicated it was also under contract to sell. The track was previously the subject of criticism from the commission over its bleak finances, and that will likely come into play if the track wants to run run some of Turf Paradise's dates.

“There is no guarantee to anybody in this – I want to make that perfectly clear,” said Tom Auther, managing member of Arizona Downs ownership, of the possibility the facility could pick up dates starting in November.

The next regularly-scheduled meeting of the Arizona commission is Sept. 14, which would make for a tight turnaround for dates approval. Auther was cautioned by commissioners and staff that the track would need to submit all financial reports as soon as possible for review, and that it should also be prepared to submit a business plan that would show number of race days, number of races per day, daily purses, and operating expenses compared to projected total revenue.

Auther said several unnamed entities have discussed investing in a meeting to make it more financially viable.

Jerry Simms, current owner of Turf Paradise, said it's still possible racing could take place there this winter. According to Simms, the current deal to sell the track to James Watson's CT Realty has a few more steps to go before it's complete. Watson has a Sept. 15 deadline by which financial approvals need to be in place and will have the chance to back out at that time. Simms reported Watson has candidly said he's 50/50 on whether he'll continue to move forward with the deal. If he does, the closing date is set for mid-December.

Watson has indicated he could be interested in continuing racing at Turf Paradise in the short-term, though the long-term plan is for development of the property.

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After he announced the track would not open in November, Simms said he received numerous calls from other entities that wanted to buy Turf and keep it as a racetrack long-term, including one from the owner of Louisiana Downs. Under the terms of his contract with Watson, though, he can't enter into talks with anyone else as long as Watson's deal is still on.

“I'm willing to help,” Simms told commissioners. “I want horse racing to continue in Arizona. I do not want horse racing to end.”

One thing Simms was clear about – he's not willing to reopen racing in November himself.

“The HBPA worked very hard to put a deal together and in the end we were told that Jerry Simms is 77 years old, he's tired, he doesn't want a race meet anymore and we have to wait till there's a new buyer,” said Leroy Gessman, executive director of the Arizona HBPA.

“I've had to loan the track over $12 million in the last few years to keep it open,” Simms said. “I did that because I thought we were going to get [HHR] machines. I felt we had a very, very good chance to get them from [former] Gov. [Doug] Ducey and that didn't happen.”

Part of the sticking point, according to Simms, was the 50/50 split of OTB profit between the track and the horsemen, which he said should be 60/40 in favor of his track. He doesn't expect Watson would be willing to take the 50/50 terms he turned down from the Arizona horsemen, but regardless the horsemen would have to negotiate their own deal with Watson to keep racing. Simms also acknowledged that if OTB operations come to a halt, interest from future owners in keeping Turf Paradise running will likely decline, since they'd be faced with trying to rehire staff for those facilities.

“Then I strongly urge you to get back to the negotiating table and I would strongly urge the horsemen to think about the big picture here,” said Chuck Coolidge, chairman of the Arizona commission.

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Breeders’ Cup Presents Connections: For DeMasi, ‘Just Being Around The Horses Is So Enjoyable’

It isn't always success on the biggest stage that keeps horsemen enjoying the task of waking up in the earliest hours of the morning. For 60-year-old Kathleen DeMasi, the first female trainer inducted into the Parx Hall of Fame, it's something much less tangible that keeps her love of the sport alive.

There's a moment that happens over the course of training a racehorse, she explained, when everything just starts to come together.

“When the light comes on and they really figure it out, and they start doing well for you, that's a big thrill,” DeMasi said. “When you finally get a horse to click, he's finally figured it out and is starting to do things right, and then he starts to show himself in the afternoon, that's probably the thing that really keeps me going.”

That moment isn't the same for every horse, of course, and sometimes it happens more by chance than by some grand design. All That Magic, winner of Monmouth's $104,000 Incredible Revenge by a nose in her first stakes try, was definitely the latter.

“I couldn't get a dirt race for her to go, so I decided, 'Why not try her on the turf?'” said DeMasi. “As we have found out, she's a different horse on the grass. It was a fun surprise!”

Now four-for-four in turf sprints, All That Magic's win in the 5 ½-furlong Incredible Revenge came nine days after a six-length romp at Monmouth against allowance company at five furlongs on the grass.

“I wasn't really worried about the added distance (her previous three wins were at five furlongs on the grass) because she has been drawing away in her wins lately,” the trainer continued. “My biggest concern was having just nine days rest. But she is just very good right now.”

It's hardly the first time DeMasi has had a filly step forward on the grass. The best horse she has trained, at least in terms of career earnings, was a filly named Joya Real.

All That Magic #2 (R) with Nik Juarez riding battles Train To Artemus #4 and Paco Lopez to win the $100,000 Incredible Revenge Stakes at Monmouth Park

“She was a horse that we had been running on the dirt, and she had knocked out a few conditions,” DeMasi said. “There was no race that I could find for her, but there was a race on the turf at Parx, and she won!”

Joya Real went on to win three stakes on the turf, and might have won a few more were it not for the rise of a tough female turf sprinter named Lady Shipman in the Mid-Atlantic around the same time. Overall, Joyal Real won 10 of her 30 career starts for earnings of over $450,000.

“Maybe I'm more apt to try a horse on the grass than some folks,” DeMasi posited. “People seem to think I do well with turf horses, especially turf fillies, and maybe it's just because I've been a little more experimental with them.”

That willingness to experiment has paid off over the course of her career: DeMasi has saddled a total of 1,744 winners thus far, including 465 under the Pewter Stable banner she launched with her husband, Greg.

Many of those Pewter Stable winners have been homebreds, the couple taking advantage of the Pennsylvania breeding program for both their own runners and a few sales yearlings. The DeMasis also stand their own stallion in the state, Winchill, a stakes-winning son of Tapit they owned and trained.

“We all know that the breeding business can be so emotionally up and down, so my hat's off to anyone who breeds a horse,” DeMasi said. “It's a good way of keeping around a quality mare rather than just selling her, but when you add up all the money and the time and the loss… We've been through it ourselves, and I've heard the stories, so to see one of those babies go on and do well is just an unbelievable feeling.

“It was really gratifying when (homebred) Winning Time won the Pennsylvania Nursery Stakes last year. He was a baby who took all summer to get ready, because he was very immature, but then he peaked at the right time and won the Nursery. Standing there in the winner's circle, it was like watching some movie made for Disney! My groom actually rubbed both the stallion and the mare, and then the baby!”

Greg DeMasi also enjoys picking horses out at the sales.

“He knows pedigrees, and I know physicals,” Kathleen DeMasi quipped. “My husband, he's such a huge sports fan, and he knows all the numbers. I think he would have made a great scout for baseball, and that's part of why he enjoys the 2-year-old sales so much. He loves trying to find the right potential in horses, and seeing them mature just like rookies in baseball.”

All That Magic was one of those picked out at the OBS Sale, purchased for $40,000. Though the filly made just one start as a 2-year-old, she's clearly blossoming in her new home on the grass.

“It's hard to win four in a row in any kind of race,” said DeMasi. “I think right now I will probably look at a race in Maryland in early September at Pimlico; I think she'll like that course. Now that she's established herself as a turf horse, we kind of can map out where we're going with her. We've always been big believers in letting the horse tell you when they're ready. They don't always have to be racing year-round.”

It's a mantra that's served DeMasi well throughout her career, dating back to 1984. It likely stems from her time spent working under Rick Dutrow Sr.; DeMasi had grown up in Pony Club, and her parents owned a few cheap racehorses, but it was nothing like the education she got in the elder Dutrow's barn.

“He was just a really great guy to work for and you learned a lot and listened and watched,” she said. “He was the kind of guy where if you make a mistake, he'd explain why you made the mistake and tell you how to fix it.”

DeMasi reflected on those early days in the racing game, looking back fondly at her time spent all over the Mid-Atlantic region.

“Back then, there was a different group of people working at the track, more families and generational horsemen,” DeMasi said. “When I was a groom, I think I had one horse that went over to the paddock with a lip chain, but now they almost all do. I question sometimes in my mind: Is it the way we're brought up in this industry, or is it the way we're breeding the horses now?

“Is that part of the reason that HISA was needed? It used to be that you apprenticed under somebody, worked under somebody, and I just think today that the old-school theory of putting in time and learning from the ground up isn't as common.

“But you have to grow with the times. I've been a board member of the Pennsylvania horsemen's association for over 15 years, which is also part of the Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association; when all this change was coming around with HISA, our organization was already sort of already doing a lot of stuff that they're doing now.”

For example, DeMasi was instrumental in getting Pennsylvania's first Thoroughbred aftercare program off the ground. Turning From Home was launched in 2008, and has provided over 3,650 former racehorses with a safe retirement.

“That's been one of the big changes I've seen in the industry,” DeMasi said. “But the whole world is changing, really. I've sort of been just quietly doing my thing in the Mid-Atlantic, so it's not like you're going to see my name all over the place. But this is what I love to do. Even though you might be tired or whatnot, just being around the horses is so enjoyable.”

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Equibase Analysis: Atone Looks Tough To Beat In Arlington Million

The Grade 1, $1-million Arlington Million Stakes has found a new and likely permanent home. It will be run at Colonial Downs in New Kent, Va., after a storied run at Arlington Park and having been run last year at Churchill Downs.

This year's race drew a field of 11, led by last year's winner Santin, but this talented turf star has not finished in the top three in six straight races since his win in 2022. Another horse with a win at this level is Atone, who was victorious in the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Turf Invitational in January. He was most recently fifth but beaten by just one length in the Grade 3 Dinner Party Stakes. That race was won by Never Explain, who next finished second in the Grade 3 Monmouth Stakes, won by Catnip. Set Piece finished fourth in last year's Million but has since won two graded stakes including the Grade 3 Arlington Stakes in June. Irish-bred Adhamo won the Grade 1 United Nations Stakes in the summer of 2022 and is returning from 10 months off.

Rockemperor, another Irish-bred, won the Grade 2 Bowling Green Stakes in 2022 and the Grade 1 Turf Classic Invitational Stakes in 2021 but enters the race off four non-threatening efforts. Win for the Money has won two straight and enters a stakes race on grass for the first time, while Strong Quality led from start to finish in winning this past February and March but in his first attempt at the level he finished fifth in the Grade 1 Manhattan Stakes in June. Chilean-bred Master Piece has been competitive at this level on occasion, for example when winning the Grade 2 Eddie Read Stakes last summer. He also has had a hard time repeating that effort as he has not won in six races since then. Strong Tide rounds out the field, with his last win coming in February of 2022 and with his best effort at this level recently a third place finish in the Grade 1 Man O'War Stakes in May.

Contender analysis and eliminations:
Before discussing the top contenders, I want to discuss why a number of horses with overall good records and hundreds of thousands of dollars won in their careers have pretty low probability to win this race.

Let's start with Rockemperor, one of two trained by Chad Brown (the other is Adhamo), who has banked $1.1 million. In spite of having won the Turf Classic Invitational in the fall of 2022 and the Bowling Green Stakes in July of 2022 he has not been competitive in five races since and, interestingly enough, was scratched out of this year's Bowling Green, which appears to have been an easier spot than the Arlington Million. Adhamo has won just once in six races since importing to the United States in the winter of 2022, and he has been away since a poor effort last October when sixth of seven in the Turf Classic Invitational. Although Brown has a good record with horses returning off long layoffs, there's not a case to be made this horse can return to Grade 1-winning form. Santin won this race last year as one of the betting favorites (2-1) but has not been competitive since then in six races, never closer than fourth or nearer than three lengths from the winner. Many of the others have been uncompetitive recently and cases cannot be made why their recent form can be reversed.

Top contenders:

After eliminating a number of horses as contenders, we're left with just a few, that group led by Atone. This past January, following 2 1/2 months off and a win last November, Atone proved to be a top turf runner when rallying from sixth to win the Pegasus World Cup Turf Invitational, earning a 109 Equibase Speed Figure. Nearly eight weeks later in the Muniz Memorial Classic, and sent to post as the prohibitive favorite, Atone finished last of nine. When returning two months later in the Dinner Party Stakes, Atone led from the start, just as he had in his victory last November, but this time he faded to fifth. However, he was beaten a total of one length and was very game all the way to the finish. For the Arlington Million, Atone gets a jockey change to Kendrick Carmouche, who has ridden the horse just one time previously and that was in his wire-to-wire win last November. With none of the three horses with gate positions inside Atone in the Million previously shown to want to be in front early in a race, Carmouche can easily put Atone on the lead from the start from where he can control the tempo and duplicate his big effort last fall. However, in the case another horse wants the lead more than Atone does, Carmouche can get Atone to relax as he did when fifth in the early stages of the Pegasus, with the same winning result.

Catnip is one of a few fairly lightly raced 4year-olds in this year's Million field, who may be able to step up to the task. He has won four of eight career races, all on grass, and has improved as expected during his spring campaign. After winning in April at the first allowance condition, Catnip improved markedly in May to earn a then career-best 102 figure, then to 106 winning the Monmouth Stakes. Moved up to the Grade 1 level and facing some multiple stakes winners in the United Nations Stakes last month, Catnip was not disgraced when making the lead in the stretch after stalking in second, then being passed by multiple stakes winner Therapist. Cutting back from that 1 3/8-mile trip to the 1 1/4 miles of the Arlington Million, Catnip has a big shot to make the lead after stalking whichever horse is in front in the stretch and perhaps hang on this time.

Master Piece has won or placed in nearly half of his 22 career start on grass, 10 to be exact, and continues to run competitively every time he steps foot on the track. Returning from nearly four months off for his first start of 2023 in the Pegasus (won by Atone), Master Piece closed strongly but too late, moving from last of 12 to be beaten just three lengths at the finish. Following that came a third-place effort with a 110 figure in the Mac Diarmida Stakes and another third-place effort in the Pan American Stakes. Given three months off and changing trainers, it appears the much shorter 1 1/16-mile race Master Piece ran in on July 4 was a prep for this much longer race. Having won the Eddie Read Stakes last summer with a 111 figure which would be very competitive if repeated, it must be noted the new trainer for Master Piece is Dick Dutrow, who recently returned to training after a long suspension. Dutrow proved he hasn't lost his ability to get horses to run big as he saddled White Abarrio to win the Whitney Stakes last weekend in an upset, and that's another reason to take Master Piece very seriously in this situation.

The rest of the field, with their best Equibase Speed Figures, is Adhamo (IRE) (107), Never Explain (110), Rockemperor (110), Santin (110), Set Piece (GB) (117), Strong Quality (106), Strong Tide (113) and Win for the Money (108).

Top Win Contenders:

Atone

Catnip

Master Piece

Arlington Million Stakes – Grade 1

Race 10 at Colonial Downs

Saturday, August 12 – Post Time 6:40 PM E.T.

One Mile and One Quarter on Turf

Three Year Olds and Upward

Purse: $1 Million

Ellis Starr is national racing analyst for Equibase.

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Longtime Kentucky Commissioner, Horseman Frank Jones, Jr. Passes

On Thursday, Gov. Andy Beshear paid tribute to Air Force Veteran Frank Jones, Jr. Jones was a leader in the Thoroughbred industry and served as vice-chairman of the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission (KHRC).

“Put simply, Frank was making a difference. He was an award-winning leader, committed to helping those within this essential Kentucky industry live better lives. I was proud to call him a friend,” said Gov. Beshear. “Frank will be missed. And my prayers are with his family, friends and the entire Thoroughbred industry. I think we all know Frank's legacy will live on.”

Members and staff of the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission are mourning the loss of long-time KHRC Commissioner, horse owner, breeder and handicapper.

“The passing of Frank Jones is a huge loss for not only his family and friends, but the entire horse racing industry,” said Kentucky Horse Racing Commission Chairman Jonathan Rabinowitz. “As a valuable member and vice-chairman of the KHRC Commission and secretary of the Kentucky Racing Health and Welfare Fund, he used his voice to elevate other horsemen, serving and providing guidance to backstretch workers who cannot afford medical assistance on their own. We have all lost a great friend who will be dearly missed.” added Rabinowitz.

“Frank was thoughtful, knowledgeable, always willing to listen and provide guidance to the Commission and staff,” said Jamie Eads, executive director of the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission. “As a Commission member, he would check in on me often, just to see how things were going. He always asked how my family was doing and he worked as an advocate for horse racing until the very end.”

Jones has served as Commissioner under three administrations. He was first appointed to the horse racing commission in March of 1997 by Gov. Paul Patton; reappointed in 2008 by Gov. Steve Beshear. And, in Jan. of 2020, Gov. Andy Beshear asked him to serve once again.

KHRC Commissioner Frank Shoop says that Jones made a positive impact in horse racing over his long successful career. “This is tough. Frank Jones was a partner in ownership and breeding for more than 25 years. He was a friend to me, and to the entire thoroughbred industry.”

Jones served as director and vice president of the Kentucky Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association for more than three decades, using his business acumen to the benefit of horsemen as chair of the finance committee, contract negotiator, legislative liaison, backside committee and secretary of the Kentucky Racing Health and Welfare Fund. He also was past president of the Louisville-based Kentucky Thoroughbred Owners Inc.

Jones, a Louisville native, attended Western Kentucky University and was a veteran of the Air Force. He also served as a past president of the Kentucky Thoroughbred Owners Inc.

“The Kentucky horse racing and breeding industry wouldn't be in the strong position it is in today without the passion, commitment and leadership of Frank Jones, Jr.,” said Churchill Downs Incorporated CEO Bill Carstanjen. “From his meaningful contribution to the Kentucky HBPA to his impact on the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission and as past president of the Kentucky Thoroughbred Owners, our sport and community lost a dear friend and tremendous advocate, and we at Churchill Downs lost a valued partner. He will be greatly missed, and our thoughts are with his family and countless number of friends and colleagues during this difficult time.”

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