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Jason Beem Hired As Track Announcer At Tampa Bay Downs

Jason Beem, who has called races at numerous Thoroughbred tracks since 2006, has been hired as the announcer at Tampa Bay Downs. He will begin on June 30, the first day of the track's two-day Summer Festival of Racing.

The 41-year-old University of Washington graduate currently announces at Grants Pass Downs in Oregon and will begin his third season at Colonial Downs in New Kent, Va., on July 19. At Tampa Bay Downs, he replaces Richard Grunder, who retired on May 2 after 37 years and more than 37,000 races at the Oldsmar oval.

Beem was chosen from among dozens of applicants after a nationwide search. A lifelong fan of racing with a strong social media following, Beem is excited to bring his enthusiastic style to a track that has grown by leaps and bounds over the past 20 years.

“I love the racing there and am excited to become a part of it,” said Beem, who hosts an hour-long podcast each Monday through Friday – the Jason Beem Horse Racing Podcast sponsored by Twinspires – on which he interviews many of the sport's leading figures.

“From calling races at Colonial Downs and Monmouth Park (in 2019), I got to know a lot of the horses and horsemen who compete at Tampa, and it really appeals to me as a fan. It's good, quality racing, the turf races are outstanding and it's a very horseplayer-friendly track.”

Margo Flynn, the Vice President of Marketing and Publicity at Tampa Bay Downs, believes Beem will be embraced by listeners accustomed to Grunder's energetic, fan-friendly style, while attracting new followers through his social-media platforms. In addition to his podcast, Beem is active on Twitter ( @BeemieAwards ) and Instagram ( @jasonbeemracing ) and has a YouTube channel.

“Jason hit all the checkpoints we were looking for,” Flynn said. “He sees racing through a fan's eyes and understands the need to cultivate new fans and develop ways to target them. He has a big pair of shoes to fill, but he has the experience and love of the sport to make his own mark at Tampa Bay Downs. We are excited to have him on board and to introduce him to our fans on June 30 and July 1.”

Beem, who started his announcing career in 2006 at River Downs (now Belterra Park), describes his race-calling style as high-energy and information-driven. “I have a quick delivery, I try to get as much information as I can to the horseplayer and I'm very descriptive. Accuracy, obviously, is the most paramount thing for me.

“It's funny because I still get nervous before every race, even a $2,500 claiming event,” he said. “I'm surprised that I always have that adrenaline rush when they're entering the gate, but I'm glad that hasn't stopped after 15 years.”

Beem knows it is a next-to-impossible task replacing Grunder, who is a jockey's agent at Canterbury Park in Shakopee, Minn. In an almost-eerie coincidence, both called races at since-closed Portland Meadows in Oregon at similar stages of their careers, with Beem working there from 2006-2014.

“I don't look at it as trying to replace him, because he is a legend,” Beem said. “I just want to be a great member of the Tampa Bay Downs team, get to know the horse-playing community and get a lot of people excited about horse racing.”

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Florida Legislature Hands Sports Betting To Seminoles, Permits Non-Thoroughbred Tracks To Decouple From Gaming

On the final day of a special session, Florida legislators on Wednesday approved three separate gambling measures that will strengthen the Seminole tribe's dominant position in the gambling market, allow non-Thoroughbred pari-mutuel facilities to decouple casinos and card rooms from their racing and jai-alai operations, and create a five-member Gaming Commission that will replace the state's Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering.

The net result will mean more competition for the state's two remaining Thoroughbred tracks, Tampa Bay Downs in Oldsmar and Gulfstream Park in Hallandale Beach. Horsemen fear that will lead to lower purse money for Gulfstream Park and a reduction in racing days, according to Stephen Screnci, president of the Florida Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association.

The bill that garnered the most attention is approval of a 30-year compact between Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Seminoles, giving the tribe a monopoly on sports betting and permitting the addition of three new casinos on the site of the existing Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, approximately 10 miles northwest of Gulfstream Park. The state gets $500 million a year from the the deal for the next five years.

The Seminoles will have a monopoly on sports betting, both at the seven Florida casinos they currently operate and via mobile applications. Pari-mutuel facilities may enter into agreements with the Seminoles to offer sports betting and split revenue with the tribe.

That portion of the legislation, along with language that could bring a new casino to Miami-Dade County off tribal land, is likely to be challenged in court by gambling opponents who say the bill violates a 2018 statewide ballot initiative that blocked any further expansion of gambling without voter approval.

The bill to approve the Seminoles compact passed 38-1 in the Senate and 97-17 in the House.

The decoupling bill likely will end live racing at South Florida's Pompano Park, the state's only harness track that opened in 1964 and is now known as Isle Casino Pompano, a Caesars Entertainment property. A last-minute amendment in the Florida House version of the bill to exempt harness racing from the decoupling law was stripped in the final version that passed the Senate by a 39-0 vote and the House in a 73-43 vote.

Hialeah Park may also have seen its last race. The historic track that once hosted South Florida's best winter Thoroughbred meet has been operating its casino since 2010 in connection with a Quarter Horse permit that began with competitive racing sanctioned by the Florida Quarter Horse Association. Those races were replaced by match races that were run so that Hialeah fulfilled its casino license obligation to conduct races as defined by Florida statute. That will no longer be necessary.

The idea of acquiring licenses for card rooms and simulcasting by running horse races began in Florida's panhandle when an operation in Gadsden County offered pari-mutuel wagering on barrel races. After a court struck down that as not fitting the definition of pari-mutuel races, lawyers familiar with state regulations came up with the idea of match races – sometimes involving flag drop starts and slow horses walking or trotting down a dirt path. Remarkably, that passed legal muster and Quarter Horse permits sprung up in several other locations around the state, with farcical races giving operators the legal right to open card rooms and simulcast parlors.

Under the bill passed on Wednesday, all those facilities may now end the sham horse races but continue to operate their card rooms and simulcasting. The same is true of the state's jai-alai frontons, which may also be decoupled. Greyhound racing became extinct at the end of 2020 after Florida voters approved a ballot initiative to ban the sport, so those tracks already have decoupled from their card rooms and simulcasting.

Screnci, the HBPA president, said revenue from slots operations to purses – currently about 20% of total purses – will fall. Currently, he said, horsemen receive about $9 million annually from the Calder Casino, but the contract with owner Churchill Downs Inc. (CDI) is set to expire on July 31. CDI previously received state approval to couple its Calder Casino operations with a jai-alai permit it acquired, allowing the company to end live racing at the track that in recent years has been leased to Gulfstream Park's owners and rebranded as Gulfstream Park West. The decoupling bill will allow CDI to stop conducting jai-alai and keep its casino open. Screnci said he has had talks with Bill Carstanjen, CEO of CDI, about the company continuing to contribute to purses, since horsemen were instrumental in Calder getting its casino license.

According to Screnci, the Gulfstream Park slots contribute about $6 million annually to purses, and that could fall as the other casinos in the region (including the former Hollywood greyhound track now known as The Big Easy casino and located just over one mile north) become more profitable.

The tax rate on slot operations run by the Seminoles is 12.5%, Screnci said, with Gulfstream Park paying a 35% tax rate.

Horsemen lobbied in Tallahassee for concessions for Thoroughbred racing, but those talks fell on “deaf ears,” Screnci said.

“We asked for a purse pool, with the decoupled permit holders contributing a portion of their funds now that they won't have to spend anything on racing,” he said. “That didn't get a lot of support. There still could be some appropriations from compact money that goes to the state. That's not dead. This compact doesn't discuss any appropriations of money. We might be able to get in the mix there.”

Screnci said the compact between the tribe and DeSantis permits Miami-Dade and Broward pari-mutuels up to a 5% tax break, but not until 2023.

“It's a bad compact,” he said, adding that even with the addition of new casinos and sports betting the state is only getting an additional $100 million per year compared to the old compact.

His fear is that with Calder no longer an option as a racetrack and purse revenue expected to decline, Gulfstream Park will have to cut racing dates. “We can only go so low (on purses),” he said. “If we lose too many racing days, the lure of year-round racing goes away. That's one way we've managed to keep stables here in October and November, by racing so many days.”

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Despite On-Track Limitations, Tampa Bay Downs Enjoys Strong Betting Season

When Richard Grunder called the 37,587th and final race of his marvelous 37-year Tampa Bay Downs career on May 2, it was as if a giant balloon whished into another dimension, never to be recaptured.

While 21st Century technology permits fans to revisit Grunder's greatest calls, such as the riveting Street Sense-Any Given Saturday duel in the 2007 Tampa Bay Derby, the Fan Appreciation Day card earlier this month was fraught with the reminder that change is inevitable in all avenues of life.

That truism had been reinforced when the 2020-'21 Oldsmar oval meeting resumed back on Nov. 25, slightly more than eight months after the COVID-19 pandemic turned everyone's world upside down. No one was certain how Thoroughbred racing fans would respond to temperature checks, mandatory face coverings and strict social distancing. Attendance was limited to about 30 percent of capacity, resulting in a combined 20.22-percent decrease in on-track and in-state handle on Tampa Bay Downs racing from the 2018-2019 (non-pandemic) meeting.

But that was more than offset by a 20.87-percent jump in out-of-state handle, from $303,474,481 to $366,794,971. The Oldsmar oval's deserved reputation as a winter hot spot that attracts runners from many of the top stables along the East Coast enabled the track to post a 16.62-percent increase in total commingled handle from 2018-2019, with the 2020-2021 season total of $394,698,371 more than $56-million above the figure from two seasons ago.

Average wagering handle per race jumped 18.62-percent, to $482,516, and average handle per entry rose 16.24-percent, to $58,370. Horsemen did their part, as the average field size increased about 2 percent, from 8.1 per race in 2018-2019 to 8.27.

The increase in wagering revenue was passed along to the horsemen. Tampa Bay Downs raised purses by 10 percent on four separate occasions, resulting in a 40-percent increase from Nov. 25 to the May 2 Closing Day card.

“Higher purses enable us to attract better horses, which in turn produces more fan interest and more wagering activity,” said Margo Flynn, the track's vice president of marketing and publicity. “We are optimistic those trends will continue next season and beyond. Our main track and our turf course are regarded as being among the most consistent and safest surfaces in the country, which serves as another enticement for owners and trainers to bring their top horses to Tampa Bay Downs.”

And, over time, the fans started coming back as attendance restrictions were gradually relaxed and people became more comfortable following the mask-wearing and social-distancing protocols. Tampa Bay Downs remains a popular destination for regular customers, first-time visitors and vacationers hoping to make a few bucks while basking in Florida sunshine and savoring Thoroughbred competition.

“As this season progressed, we seemed to notice more new faces throughout the facility than in past years,” Flynn said. “It's an encouraging sign that people are choosing an afternoon at the track as a fun activity to begin returning to some kind of normal lifestyle.”

The track's biggest day of racing, the March 6 Festival Day card Presented by Lambholm South, lived up to its reputation for world-class racing. In the Grade 2, $400,000 Lambholm South Tampa Bay Derby, lightly raced 3-year-old colt Helium turned back all challengers, springing a 15-1 upset under 56-year-old jockey Jose Ferrer, a Tampa resident.

That same afternoon, fellow 3-year-olds Domain Expertise and Winfromwithin set records in the Grade 3 Florida Oaks and the Columbia Stakes, respectively. Such excellence was not overlooked by bettors, who wagered an all-time Tampa Bay Downs record of $15,229,366 on the day's action.

The season climaxed on another high note, with a crowd of 4,872 – roughly half of what would be expected in “normal” years, but limited by COVID-19 – attending the May 1 card highlighted by the simulcast of the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve.

The gains in wagering and purse increases are positive signs for the 2021-2022 meeting, which begins on July 1 (the second day of the track's two-day Summer Festival of Racing) before resuming in late November.

Tampa Bay Downs has positioned itself in recent years as the premier multi-entertainment facility on the west coast of Florida, with horse racing, The Silks Poker Room, The Downs Golf Practice facility and numerous fine-dining options luring new and repeat customers alike.

The competition to be leading jockey was tight throughout the meeting, with Samy Camacho and Antonio Gallardo trading the lead several times. Camacho, who had won the title in 2018-2019, overcame a 2-for-43 slump in the meeting's second half to overcome his rival, riding four winners on May 2 to turn back Gallardo, himself a five-time track champion, by a 107-103 margin.

The trainer's race, by contrast, was over almost before it had begun. Gerald Bennett possessed the numbers, the skill and the touch to send out 56 winners, 22 more than his closest pursuer, Jose H. Delgado. The title was the sixth in a row for Bennett, who along the way passed the late Frank H. Merrill, Jr., as the No. 1 Canadian-born trainer in racing history with 3,975 victories.

Track officials acknowledge it will take fans some time to get used to a new announcer (Grunder remains active in the sport as a jockey's agent at Canterbury Park in Minnesota). “Richard's departure will be keenly felt,” Flynn said. “Many fans and simulcast bettors associate his voice with Tampa Bay Downs, and the next announcer will have some big shoes to fill.”

For Tampa Bay Downs, which will celebrate its 96^th anniversary season eager to build on past successes, Grunder's trademark calls and vast knowledge are legacies to build on.

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‘And That’s A Wrap From Tampa’: Richard Grunder Calls Final Race

After calling his 37,587th horse race Sunday at Tampa Bay Downs in Oldsmar, Fla., announcer Richard Grunder succeeded – barely – in keeping his emotions under control.

“And that's a wrap from Tampa,” Grunder said as the aptly named Friendly Fella crossed the wire in first in the 10th race, “and God bless everyone involved in the Thoroughbred industry.”

Once the race became official, the jockeys and their valets lined up in the winner's circle, waving toward the press box and shouting their encouragement to the man whose voice is the only one most Oldsmar followers have ever known.

“Thank you guys. Thank you so much,” said Grunder, known far and wide as a vocal supporter of race riders.

With the understanding that all the attention he has received since announcing his retirement has made him uncomfortable (although he never showed it), on to the action on closing day of the 2020-2021 season.

Video of Richard Grunder's final call at Tampa Bay Downs

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