Tag: Top News

Brown, Ortiz Register Year-End NYRA Titles

Chad Brown won his sixth consecutive New York Racing Association, Inc. (NYRA) year-end training title with 91 wins while Jose Ortiz compiled his second riding crown with 142 victories as racing in 2020 was capped with the conclusion of the Aqueduct card on Dec. 31.

Klaravich Stables was the runaway winner as top owner, racking up 48 wins, 14 more than the next-closest competitor, Repole Stable, to finish as the leading owner for the second straight year at NYRA tracks, which encompasses Belmont Park, Saratoga Race Course and Aqueduct Racetrack.

Ortiz posted a record of 142-139-95 in 707 mounts to win his first year-end title since 2016. His 2020 saw him win his 2,000th career race while posting $9.62 million in earnings with a 20.08% winning percentage on the NYRA circuit.

“I’m pretty happy about it and I’m very proud of the work we put into it,” Ortiz said. “This is why you work this hard. It was a tough year. We couldn’t work horses in the morning like we normally could, but we made it through and I’m just happy we’re all healthy coming out of this.”

Brown compiled a 91-81-83 record with 411 starters to become the first NYRA trainer to record six straight training titles since Gasper Moschera from 1993-98. He won two individual meets, leading the Belmont spring/summer with 23 wins and the Belmont fall with 22 victories. He ended 2020 ahead of Todd Pletcher, whose 81 wins were the second-most among conditioners.

The four-time reigning Eclipse Award Champion trainer racked up earnings of more than $7.4 million while winning more than 22% of the time. Brown’s starters finished on the board at a 62.04% clip.

Headed by Seth Klarman, Klaravich Stables won at least a share of four of the five individual NYRA individual meets in 2020. Klaravich won the Belmont fall and spring/summer outright, as well as Saratoga, while tying Repole Stable for the recently concluded Aqueduct fall meet.

In total, Klaravich sent out 171 starters, going 48-30-39, winning at a 28.07% clip, while racking up earnings of $3.23 million in the process. Repole Stable’s stellar 34 wins was second-most on the circuit.

The post Brown, Ortiz Register Year-End NYRA Titles appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Pennsylvania Casinos Reopen Monday

Pennsylvania casinos have been greenlighted to reopen as of Monday, Jan. 4, rekindling revenue streams that fund Thoroughbred purses in the state.

Governor Tom Wolf announced Dec. 30 that because COVID-19 mitigation efforts have been working to tamp down the spread of the pandemic, he will allow more stringent safety restrictions that went into effect Dec. 12 to expire as planned.

But that doesn’t mean a full-blown opening for the 13 casinos in the state: Mitigation efforts will roll back to what they were on Dec. 11, which still caps casinos at 50% of occupancy. Similar restrictions were also eased for other social activities, like indoor dining, gyms, theaters and high school sports.

Parx and Penn National are the only two Thoroughbred tracks operating in Pennsylvania at this time of year.

“I think that’s really good news. We can go back to getting monies from the casinos, and that’s very important to us,” said Pennsylvania Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association President Sal DeBunda in a video message posted to the organization’s website Dec.31.

DeBunda noted owners will still not be able to enter the winner’s circle to pose with their horses, “so it’s not a total open situation, but it’s back to the old rules before the mitigation rules were put in.”

Earlier this week, Penn National had announced a contingency plan to stay open through the month of January based on maintaining a nightly handle benchmark of $1.4 million in the event that Wolf had decided to extend the casino shutdown.

The post Pennsylvania Casinos Reopen Monday appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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2020 FanDuel Racing Moment of the Year Voting Open

Eleven of the most memorable events from the last 12 months of Thoroughbred racing are up for the 2020 FanDuel Racing NTRA Moment of the Year, which is determined by fan voting and recognized at the upcoming Eclipse Awards. To vote or to view the complete listing of eligible moments, visit the National Thoroughbred Racing Association (NTRA) website https://www.ntra.com/2020-moment-of-the-year/. Voting can also be executed via Twitter, where every retweet or use of the official hashtag for the moments as presented on the @NTRA account will be counted as one vote. Votes for the poll must be submitted by Jan. 12 at 11:59 p.m. (ET).

The FanDuel Racing-NTRA Moment of the Year, which will be revealed during a virtual ceremony for the 50th Annual Eclipse Awards Jan. 28, 2021, will be presented from Spendthrift Farm in Lexington and streamed on multiple platforms and televised on TVG.

The post 2020 FanDuel Racing Moment of the Year Voting Open appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Top Videos of the Year

It was a record-breaking year for video production at the TDN, and for video views, with over 3.8 million TDN videos and advertisers’ commercials shown on our platforms. We took a look to see what you were watching the most. Here are our top 10 videos of the year, as watched on the TDN’s YouTube Channel and the TDN site combined. Click on the red links below to watch.

  1. Zenyatta and Her Candy Ride Filly at Lane’s End. 108,960 views. She may be the fan-favorite of all time.
  2. Meet the First Foal from Songbird, By Arrogate. 91,160 views. Even though this video was published in March of 2019, it had legs, racking up over 90,000 views in 2020.
  3. The Incomparable, Invincible, Unbeatable Cigar. 56,962 views. This 20-minute video wasn’t published until October 16 under the TDN Look banner, but still racked up an impressive amount of views…even if it was a little depressing when Tom Durkin told us that what he had really said was “unconquerable” and not “incomparable.” Whoops.
  4. A.P. Indy Turns 30. 51,968 views. Here’s another video with legs: published in March, 2019, it racked up over 50,000 views in 2020 alone.
  5. Authentic Retired to Spendthrift. 49,163 views. The retirement and arrival of the sure-to-be Horse of the Year at Spendthrift was seen almost 50,000 times.
  6. The Late Arrogate’s First Yearlings go to Market. 44,189 views. Between the video on his Songbird foal and this one featuring his first yearlings, Arrogate was a popular, if sadly tragic, topic for viewers in 2020.
  7. Taylor Made Stallions on the Rise, 41,217 views. Katie Ritz talks to Frank and Ben Taylor about first-crop sire Not This Time, Midnight Storm and Taylor Made’s new arrival, Instagrand.
  8. An Unexpected Storybook Ending for Midnight Bisou. 36, 963 views. Owner Jeff Bloom reminisces on the incredible career of Midnight Bisou as she prepares to sell at the Fasig-Tipton November sale.
  9. Songbird Celebrates Her Second Mother’s Day. 33,296 views. This addition gives Songbird has two of the top 10 videos of the year. People clearly love checking in with the top mares.
  10. Volatile Settling in at Three Chimneys, 26,182 views. New stallion visits are always popular, and Volatile sat just off the pace of Authentic as this year’s leader.
  11. Tour Newmarket With John Berry, 23,052 views. Early on in the pandemic, we tried to help people feel as if they were getting out of their homes with video tours. John Berry was kind enough to take us on a multi-part tour of Newmarket and the series drew tens of thousands of views.

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