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California COVID-19 Update

News last week that more than 200 people living or working on-site at Golden Gate Fields had tested positive for COVID-19, and that the facility would have to close its doors to live racing through November, arrived against a state-wide backdrop of rising cases, hospitalizations and COVID-related deaths.

As with Golden Gate, these trends have landed with subsidiary impacts. Over the weekend, L.A. County public health officials suspended outdoor restaurant dining. Before that, the county announced other restrictions, including curfews and capacity limitations at certain stores and other public places.

This has prompted some within the industry to wonder whether other California tracks might fall foul of the reimposition of business restrictions–as happened at Santa Anita earlier in the year, for example, when the facility was temporarily closed as the pandemic first took grip.

TDN reached out to representatives of Golden Gate for information on the status of the positive cases, along with the chances of live racing resuming in December. David Duggan, Golden Gate general manager and vice president, responded in a message Tuesday that an update would be arriving soon.

Los Alamitos has thus far avoided being shuttered as a result of the pandemic, though the facility did cause a stir earlier this year, with an outbreak among the SoCal jockey colony was blamed by some on lax protocols at the track’s jock’s room–an accusation track management hotly denied.

Los Alamitos is in Orange County, another region where COVID cases, hospitalizations and deaths are on the rise. The facility is scheduled to conduct a live daytime Thoroughbred meet running Friday Dec. 4 through Sunday Dec. 20.

According to Jack Liebau, vice president of the Los Alamitos Racing Association, there are “at this moment” no confirmed COVID cases among people living or working on-site at the track, “that we know of.”

As a result, the anticipated December meet at Los Alamitos is expected to proceed as scheduled, said Liebau–though he emphasized the unpredictable nature of the pandemic.

“It could change within the hour,” he said, pointing to the vagaries surrounding testing and accuracy of results. At Golden Gate, for example, 95% of the cases were reportedly asymptomatic. “It’s a bad situation–I worry about myself getting it. It’s personal.”

Horses currently shipped from Golden Gate to other facilities, including Los Alamitos, are being sent without their usual grooms to be housed at the barn of a local trainer. As a consequence, the Los Alamitos program book will list the substitute trainer alongside that of the official trainer, Liebau explained.

The current 15-day Del Mar fall season is scheduled to end this Sunday. All jockeys flying in from out-of-state to ride at Del Mar this weekend tested negative 72 hours prior to arriving, “and they’re all getting tested again once they’re in San Diego,” said Josh Rubinstein, Del Mar Thoroughbred Club president. “They’ll also reside in the auxiliary jock’s room for the duration that they’re here.”

Unlike the recent Del Mar summer meet, comprising some 1800 horses and 1000 backstretch staff, the current fall meet is being conducted on a smaller scale–some 400 horses and 250 staff, said Rubinstein.

One backstretch worker tested positive for COVID at the start of the current meet, said Rubinstein. None since, he added. “We’ve been very diligent, reminding people of how serious this is,” Rubinstein said.

Further afield is the start of the next Santa Anita meet, penciled in for Dec. 26. According to Nate Newby, Santa Anita senior vice president, the facility hasn’t recently received communication from the LA County public health department “for a couple reasons.”

For one, “since they’ve implemented those new rules, and we’re not open for simulcasting, it wouldn’t really apply to us,” he said. “But with the meet being a month away, I’m sure they’ll be checking in.”

Secondly, the Arcadia facility hasn’t had a positive COVID case in 14 days, said Newby. “The threshold they’re looking at is if you have three in the last 14 days, then they start looking at your facility, the employees and anybody on site,” he said. “Knock on wood, we’re on a bit of a good stretch.”

The scheduled winter-spring meet will be conducted under similar conditions and restrictions as the recently concluded autumn meet, said Newby, not that the facility has loosened protocols in the interim. “We still have the backstretch really locked down to essential workers only,” he said.

“We’re just going to keep doing everything we’re doing, and hope,” Newby added, before pointing to the Moderna and Pfizer developed vaccines that are reportedly 90% effective. “I think, along with everybody, we’re rooting for the vaccine and other things to be in a better situation in a couple months.”

In a recently released draft interim plan for a vaccine rollout in California, such an effort will be done in three phases, beginning with health care and other essential workers, followed by other targeted groups including vulnerable populations and underserved communities. The third phase will encompass remaining populations.

According to California Horse Racing Board executive director, Scott Chaney, the board hasn’t yet opened a dialogue with the governor’s office about how rollout of a vaccine might overlap the racing industry.

“I know that’s a national conversation right now, and it seems like in the next month or two a vaccine might come online,” Chaney said. “But as far as I’m aware, the CHRB hasn’t had any discussions based on who gets them and so on and so forth.”

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Los Al Winter Meet Begins Dec. 4

Five stakes races–three of which are graded–highlight the 2020 Los Angeles County Fair Winter Thoroughbred meet at Los Alamitos. The season will begin Friday, Dec. 4 and continue through Sunday, Dec. 20.

Racing is scheduled to be conducted Friday-Sunday the first week (Dec. 4-6) and Thursday-Sunday the final two weeks (Dec. 10-13 and Dec. 17-20). Post time will be 1 p.m. on weekdays and 12:30 p.m. on weekends.

The $300,000 GI Starlet S. and the $200,000 GII Los Alamitos Futurity will be run, respectively, Saturday, Dec. 5 and Saturday, Dec. 19. Both races are at 1 1/16 miles and being offered at Los Alamitos for the seventh time.

Hall of Famer Bob Baffert won both the Starlet and Futurity for a third consecutive year in 2019 and has won all six runnings of the Futurity at Los Alamitos.

The other graded stakes race is the GIII Bayakoa S., which will be offered Sunday, Dec. 6.

Live racing will continue to be run with no spectators and only essential personnel allowed inside the facility to conduct the program.

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CHRB Approves Continuing Education Program For Trainers; Poised To Further Tighten Corticosteroid, Thyroxin Use

The California Horse Racing Board at its regularly scheduled meeting on Thursday gave final approval to a continuing education program for trainers and their assistants, adopted a Multiple Medication Violations (MMV) program and took a first step toward curtailing over-use of thyroid medication.

The regulatory agency tabled until its next meeting in December a requirement that would restrict all intra-articular injections of corticosteroids to 30 days prior to racing and 10 days prior to a timed workout.

The latter issue came up in a discussion concerning agreements between the Los Alamitos Quarter Horse Racing Association and the horsemen's group for 2021. Board chairman Dr. Gregory Ferraro said CHRB Rule 1581 permits a track's race conditions to set rules on administration of medication, provided the racing association has approval from the respective horsemen's organization and the CHRB.

Beginning in March 2019, restrictions on intra-articular injections of corticosteroids were part of those agreements with California tracks. Santa Anita and Del Mar, which dramatically reduced catastrophic injuries in racing to the point there were no dirt track breakdowns throughout entire meetings, had a 30-day cutoff before races on fetlock joint corticosteroid injections and 10 days before workouts. The reduction in catastrophic injuries since the new rules went into effect “demonstrated this was a real problem,” Ferraro said.

CHRB executive director Scott Chaney said trainers at Los Alamitos, which was put on probation by the board earlier this year after a spike in fatalities, appear to be more aggressive with corticosteroids. Chaney said a review of necropsies for fatally injured horses found an average of 0.6 intraarticular corticosteroid injections lifetime for Thoroughbreds at Santa Anita, Del Mar and Golden Gate Fields. A similar review of fatalities at Los Alamitos found an average of 3.0 per horse, Chaney said.

Ferraro said he will recommend extending the 30-day stand down prior to racing for all intra-articular corticosteroid injections – not just in the fetlock joint – and at all tracks in the state. The recommendation will include a 10-day stand down prior to speed training.

Los Alamitos has agreed to include those conditions in its horseman's agreement and has also hired two additional investigators and added security cameras to its barn area.

Under the new regulation for continuing education (CHRB Rule 1503.5), trainers and assistant trainers by June 1, 2021 (and at time of license renewals thereafter) will be required to complete a total of 12 hours of approved continuing education during the preceding 36-month period. Dr. Rick Arthur, the CHRB equine medical director, said he will work in consultation with Thoroughbred Trainers of California to submit a curriculum well in advance of the 2021 deadline so that trainers can fulfill that requirement.

Arthur submitted a proposed schedule of webinars that may begin in January and include courses on basic pharmacology, drug testing, track surfaces, lameness and diagnostic imaging, equine biosecurity, equine fetlock, neurological conditions of racehorses, pre-race examinations, pharmacology of corticosteroids and non-steroidal anti-inflammatories, bisphosphonates, fractures and jockey safety, among others.

Arthur expressed frustration that thyroxin has not been more tightly regulated and recommended that the board adopt a rule that requires a thyrotropin-releasing hormone-response test to demonstrate hypothyroidism – which he called “virtually nonexistent” – before thyroxin can be prescribed. He said New York has adopted a similar regulation and that the Stronach Group has imposed a house rule to that effect at its tracks in Maryland and Florida.

In addition to the CHRB's reports on sudden deaths in 2013 that cited widespread thyroid medication use in horses that died suddenly, Arthur said the Stronach Group has seen a large number of sudden deaths during racing and training in Maryland involving horses on thyroid supplementation.

From Jan. 1, 2020, until early October, Arthur said, nearly half of 256 thyroid prescriptions at California tracks were for two trainers and 80% involved three veterinarians. He did not name the trainers or vets.

The proposed rule was passed unanimously. It will go out for public comment before it returns to the board for a final vote.

The Multiple Medication Violations rule, an amendment to Rule 1843.4, will specify enhanced penalties for multiple violations and establish a point system under which the the enhanced penalties are imposed and include violations from both inside and outside of California.

The CHRB also approved a 2021 racing schedule for Northern California fairs, with Pleasanton getting June 16-July 13; Sacramento, July 14-Aug. 3; Sonoma, Aug. 4-Aug. 17; Humboldt County (Ferndale), Aug. 18-Aug. 31; Golden Gate Fields, Aug. 25-Oct. 5, and Oct. 20-Dec. 21; and Fresno Oct. 6-Oct. 19.

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View From The Eighth Pole: Del Mar Can Add Year-Round Stability To California’s Racing Industry

California's horse racing industry has never been good at long-range planning. Instability will do that. Historic Bay Meadows racetrack in San Mateo in the Bay Area was shuttered for development in 2008. The same company that closed Bay Meadows had purchased Hollywood Park in Inglewood near Los Angeles in 2005 and almost immediately threatened to close that track, too, unless some form of relief from expanded gambling came along. It never did, and the “track of lakes and flowers” ran its last race in 2013. Despite advance warnings, the industry seemed unprepared when the tracks closed.

Thoroughbred breeders and owners like stability. The timeline from planning to breeding to foaling to racing is a four-year process. Owners who buy yearlings or 2-year-olds in training at public auction are looking at months to years before they can see their investments competing on the racetrack.

Instability, along with challenging economics, have led to serious declines in California breeding. The state's Thoroughbred foal crop in 2006 – the one eligible to race in that final year at Bay Meadows – numbered 3,320. The most recent California foal crop was 1,594 in 2019, a 52% drop over 13 years. There appears to be no slowing down, either. The number of mares bred in California fell by 12.5% from 2019 to 2020, from 2,018 to 1,766 mares, according to the breed's official registry, The Jockey Club.

Looking down the road, at least one more California racetrack is destined to close in the not-so-distant future. Dr. Edward Allred, the 84-year-old owner of Los Alamitos in Cypress, has made no secret of the fact his track will be developed in a matter of years. To his credit, Allred stepped up to provide additional stabling when Hollywood Park closed and expanded the Quarter Horse racing surface to accommodate year-round training, plus several weeks of Thoroughbred racing annually. Allred has been sufficiently compensated; in addition to host simulcast revenue during live Thoroughbred race meets, Los Alamitos receives $12,500 daily from the state's Stabling and Vanning Committee for providing 825 stalls.

Stabling at Los Alamitos was a stopgap measure. It's time for the California horse racing industry to develop a longer-term solution that provides some stability to the state's owners and breeders if this industry is to have a future.

Del Mar, just to the north of San Diego, could be the answer. The track races 12 weeks annually, with separate summer and fall meets, then closes its stables the rest of the year.

The racetrack property is owned by the state of California and leased by the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club from the 22^nd District Agricultural Association, which until 2020 has hosted the annual San Diego County Fair – one of the largest in the United States. The fair represented a sizable percentage of the 22^nd District's annual revenue, but so did its lease agreement with the Thoroughbred Club, especially since the races traditionally attract large crowds that spend significant sums on food and beverage.

This year's fair, along with on-track attendance at Del Mar's summer and fall meets, were nixed by the coronavirus pandemic. The 22^nd District took an enormous financial hit – revenue is down 90% – and without deep cash reserves it was forced to lay off 60% of its work force of 157 full-time employees.

Year-round stabling would supply a significant financial boost to the 22^nd District, provided Del Mar would get the same per diem arrangement Los Alamitos currently enjoys. There would be hurdles to clear to make this possible, one of them being the San Diego County Fair that traditionally begins in early June and runs through July 4 is so big that it spills onto the racetrack and into the stable area. Downsizing the fair, however, may be a necessity in the wake of COVID-19.

Because it is a state-owned facility and not subject to the pressures of development, Del Mar presents an excellent long-term option for year-round training and, if given the opportunity, expanded live race meets. The track has already satisfied federal Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) water runoff requirements, something many other tracks are struggling with. Another benefit to year-round stabling could put the city of Del Mar in compliance with a state law requiring a minimum amount of housing for low-income families. Stable employees living on the backstretch might check that box.

California trainers surveyed for this story said they would jump at the opportunity to maintain part of their stable at Del Mar. Some speculate that Midwest or East Coast trainers would be more inclined to maintain an auxiliary string of horses in California if Del Mar played an expanded role.

“We need to have viable long-term racing and training venues in Southern California,” Thoroughbred Owners of California president Greg Avioli said. “There's no question owners and trainers appreciate the opportunity to train at Del Mar, and should the opportunity present itself for year-round training, it's definitely something the TOC would consider.”

California can't afford to wait for the next track to close before developing a better blueprint for training and racing, for stability in the industry. The time is now to work on that plan.

That's my view from the eighth pole.

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