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Fonner Files: Old Man Winter Frosts Opening Weekend

Fonner Park CEO Chris Kotulak shares slices of life from the Grand Island, Neb., racetrack throughout the 2021 meet in the Fonner Files.

Fonner Park begins its 11 weekends of racing this Friday, just as we begin to break free from record-low temperatures that caused the racetrack to be closed for training for the last two weeks. Many horses and horsemen have yet to arrive from Oklahoma and Texas as the polar vortex has frozen nearly an entire nation.

The interruption in training and disruption of arriving horses means short fields and fewer races for opening weekend. Fonner has begun their season in February for decades and the show will mush on.

Last year, “Fon” was at the center of the racing universe due to COVID-19, and tens of thousands of new fans were born and exposed to five-eights-mile racing. Four-furlong races, up-close action and the return of the Dinsdale Pick 5 Jackpot is all on tap as they ready to Bring On The Fon! For updated information, click here.

Groom Willie Moon gives Pickles N Me a face clip ahead of a start in Friday's opening day card at Fonner Park.

The post Fonner Files: Old Man Winter Frosts Opening Weekend appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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After a Year to Remember, Fonner Park Returns Friday

In 2020, America discovered Fonner Park in Grand Island, Nebraska. With COVID-19 raging, Fonner was one of a handful of tracks able to soldier on in the months of March, April and May, producing handle numbers that shattered anything they had done before. Jockeys, trainers and horses who had been toiling in obscurity for years were thrust front and center, their every move covered by TVG. Fonner was a feel-good story at a time when those were in short supply.

The little track is back. Fonner's 2021 meet begins Friday, but it won't be anything like last year. While the coronavirus is still a serious problem, most racetracks are running, so there are no openings on the simulcast schedule for Fonner to take advantage of and the competition from places like Gulfstream, Aqueduct and Santa Anita means that Fonner's handle will dwindle back into the low six figures. They're back to running a Friday-through-Sunday schedule and know that their season in the spotlight is a thing of the past.

“In 2020, we knew there was something very specific going on because of COVID,” said Fonner CEO Chris Kotulak. “We were running on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday at a time when there were just five racetracks in the country running. During the week, it was just us and Will Rogers Downs. Of course, that isn't the case anymore. On top of that there are quite a few other sporting events and other wagering opportunities now. Vegas is back. Sports betting is certainly more profound than it was a year ago. The rest of the world has other betting options now so I'm not sure that anybody in Paris or Santiago, Chile will be betting on us like they were last year.”

Not that there will be a pall over this opener. It's just that Fonner will go to back to being what it always was, a local track that has learned how to survive without bells, whistles, million dollar handles or graded stakes. It's the people of Nebraska that have made Fonner special, something out of a different and better era for the sport. Pre-pandemic, the on-track crowds were so healthy that they sold out all the seats in the grandstand on Saturdays. This year, the fans will be allowed back, but, because of COVID-19, Fonner plans to limit the crowd to 75% of capacity. That will allow them to seat about 4,000 fans.

“These people love their horse racing and they love to have a good time in the afternoon,” Kotulak said. “We're here to give them what they want. They are rabidly eager to return.”

Kotulak said that a mask mandate will be strictly enforced and that anyone who refuses to wear one will be asked to leave. It's personal for him. In October, both he and his wife tested positive for the virus.

“It knocked me out for almost an entire month,” he said. “I had tremendous fatigue and body aches, a little bit of a headache. I'm over it but that doesn't mean I am invincible. I want everybody else to go by that same mantra.”

Some things will be the same from last year. Jake Olesiak will be back to defend his riding title. The Isai Gonzalez barn and the Kelli Martinez barn will likely battle it out for leading trainer. And Fonner, which added several horizontal wagers last year to satisfy demand, will be back with a betting menu that includes Pick Fours and Pick Fives.

“We're going to resume as if there was no change at all in our presentation,” Kotulak said. “That means offering all of the additional Pick Four and Pick Five wagers we added to our wagering menu last year. When we did that, people just gobbled them up.”

While Kotulak understands that handle will fall dramatically at the upcoming meet, he's hopeful that at least some of the horseplayers who discovered Fonner last year liked it enough that they will be back for more.

“People realized that Fonner Park is a charming little gem of racing in the United States,” he said. “There were people who had never seen racing from Fonner Park before and I think many of them were pleasantly surprised. How many Thoroughbred tracks are there that conduct racing over a five-eighths of a mile racetrack? That was new for a lot of people and I think they liked that up close, tight action that happens on a five-eighths racetrack.”

This year's meet will run through Kentucky Derby Day, May 1. The highlight will once again be the April 24, $75,000 Bosselman Pump & Pantry/Gus Fonner Stakes. It was won last year by Sleepy Eyes Todd (Paddy O'Prado), who will attempt to become the first horse in history to pull off the Bosselman-Saudi Cup double.

It's easy to be optimistic about Fonner's future. In the November election, Nebraskans voted to allow the state's racetracks to open up casinos. Fonner has yet to select a company it will partner with to build the casino, but Kotulak said expectations are that the casino will be up and running toward the end of this year. That will mean that the track's future is guaranteed and that the 2022 meet will feature a healthy bump in purses. Kotulak expects they will double.

That won't make Fonner Park Santa Anita Park or anything close to it, but that's OK. Fonner has never tried to be something that it's not.

The post After a Year to Remember, Fonner Park Returns Friday appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Serrano’s Drug Test Raises Questions About How Racing Will Deal With Medical Marijuana Cards

The legalization of medical marijuana has been spreading across the United States for the past several years, and on July 27, stewards at Mountaineer Park faced a decision that racing jurisdictions around the country will likely see more of in the near future.

Jockey Keivan Serrano underwent a random drug test on July 26, and was found to have THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol, in his system. (THC is the primary psychoactive compound in marijuana.)

Serrano possesses a medical marijuana card, though it was obtained in Ohio. Mountaineer is located in New Cumberland, W.V. and Ohio's medical marijuana office does not have any reciprocity agreements with other states.

West Virginia passed a medical cannabis bill three years ago when Senate Bill 386 was signed into law on Apr. 19, 2017. The bill's language set a goal of having infrastructure such as dispensaries, medical marijuana cards, etc., in place within two years, but it still hasn't happened.

“Medical marijuana is legal in West Virginia,” said West Virginia attorney Harley Wagner. “The legislation has been passed, it's just that the components to it actually coming to fruition aren't in place yet.”

Until then, any individual caught with marijuana in their possession in West Virginia is still able to be cited by police. Wagner explained that for a small amount of marijuana, the case could be taken to court and the citation could be expunged after six months if the person does not accrue any similar citations.

Serrano did not have any marijuana in his possession when he was tested by the stewards at Mountaineer. At the time of his testing — after the races on July 26 — Serrano said he was straightforward with the testing agent about his medical marijuana card, and included the information on the official testing report.

Serrano said stewards called him the following morning to tell him he'd tested positive for THC, as he'd expected. They asked about Serrano's card, and why he had the prescription.

“I use it to sleep at night,” Serrano said. “We race at night, and sometimes I don't get home until 11:30 at night, then I'd have to get up again at five the next morning. So it helps me sleep.”

Serrano said the stewards asked him to send them the documentation he had in his possession, because West Virginia racing rules indicate that a licensee testing positive for a prescription drug is not subject to penalties, under rule 178-1-24.3.v. He also said that the stewards told him this was their first time dealing with a medical marijuana card held by a licensee.

It was Serrano's second positive test for THC in 2020 — he also tested positive at Fonner Park in Nebraska back in March.

Serrano found out via the ARCI website on July 29 that he had been summarily suspended by the stewards, pending a hearing scheduled for Aug. 5.

According to Joe Moore, executive director of the West Virginia Racing Commission, Serrano was suspended because he “did not produce a document which identified the amount or dosage of medical marijuana that was permissible for him to ingest in appropriate and specified intervals, nor did he produce a document that would have allowed the Stewards to determine whether the amount of THC in his system was consistent with a prescribed dosage.”

The level of THC in Serrano's system at the time of the test was not made public in the official ruling.

Serrano made waves on social media after the suspension became public, announcing he was leaving the sport of horse racing, but the 22-year-old said his retirement from the saddle had been on the horizon for a while.

“I've always struggled with my weight, and I always told myself that if I ever got scared or if I got too heavy, that I would stop,” Serrano said. “I don't want to not give owners and trainers 100 percent, because that's something I pride myself on.”

Serrano plans to return to school in Puerto Rico. He'll attend pre-med classes online beginning in August with the goal of one day becoming a neurosurgeon.

“I had a good run,” said Serrano, who retires with 105 wins from 1,129 starts. “I don't have any regrets.”

In the meantime, the West Virginia racing commission has not officially made a determination regarding the use of medical marijuana in licensees, including jockeys.

“The West Virginia Racing Commission has not addressed medical marijuana in its rules inasmuch as the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources (WVDHHR), the state agency responsible for administering West Virginia's medical marijuana program, has not implemented the program and rules in West Virginia,” Moore explained. “It remains to be seen how the state of West Virginia will address the recognition of other state programs and other state medical marijuana authorization cards. Until such time as the Racing Commission has more direction and guidance from the WVDHHR, it is premature to make amendments to the rules of racing.”

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