Against the backdrop of an increasingly competitive and challenging landscape for luring both racehorses and racing fans, officials from Del Mar Thoroughbred Club (DMTC) outlined to the California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) the track's plans for promoting the upcoming 15-date autumn race meet during a Sept. 22 meeting.
Modifications to the stakes schedule, a holding steady of the overnight purse structure and the Ship & Win program, a new marketing mindset, and a change to the Pick Six payout structure are all in the mix for Del Mar's Nov. 11-Dec. 4 meet.
At the same time, the seaside oval is also well into the planning stages for hosting the 2017 Breeders' Cup World Championships (BC).
The Del Mar discussions anchored a sizable chunk of Thursday's monthly CHRB meeting after two separate agenda items–the allocation of 2017 northern California race dates and amendments to CHRB rules to allow tracks to write medication-free race conditions–were both tabled until October.
With regard to bolstering on-track attendance, DMTC chief marketing officer Craig Dado said a poll that the track conducted last winter among greater San Diego residents showed that 78% of respondents were aware Del Mar raced during August, but that only 40% of them were aware the track had recently added a November/December meet.
“This is our third fall season at Del Mar, and [the poll] really has told us that we really need to focus on awareness,” Dado said. “So the advertising this year will be a little bit different in that we will not be emphasizing Bing Crosby and 'old Hollywood' as much. Instead, we will be emphasizing, 'Hey, we're open.'”
Dado continued: “We're very aggressive for free tickets for the fall. What we've got going for us in the fall is we have capacity. As you well know, in the summer, things are sold out, there's not a lot we can do other than to [get customers through the admission] gate. In the fall, we can actually let them go in the Turf Club; let them have tables that are impossible to get in the summer. So what we're really trying to do is upgrade people and enhance their experience for the fall.”
Racing and industry relations executive vice president Tom Robbins detailed both cuts and additions to the stakes schedule.
A trio of races that Del Mar picked up last year (the GII Goldikova S., the Golden State Juvenile S., and Golden State Juvenile Fillies S.) will revert to Santa Anita Park. The Desi Arnaz S. has been dropped. The GII Bayakoa H., last run at Los Alamitos Race Course in 2014, has been added. Three stakes (the GII Hollywood Turf Cup, GII Seabiscuit H., and GIII Native Diver H.) have all been trimmed by $50,000, but “they are all at the American graded stakes minimum,” Robbins said.
The Ship & Win program–start a horse at Del Mar that last ran out of state–still nets owners an extra 30% bonus on top of purse money, plus $1,000 just for making that start.
“With the nationally shrinking inventory of horses, we're doing our part to try to bolster our local population,” Robbins said. “It's surprising what it does and how it helps the following meets, the meets that follow Del Mar.”
On the subject of overnight purse levels, Robbins said “we're intending to run the same purse structure that we had last year that will match the Santa Anita autumn meet purse levels.”
Del Mar will also be requesting a modification to the way the Pick Six bet is paid out, chief operating officer Josh Rubinstein explained.
Del Mar's traditional model paid 85% of the after-takeout pool to six-of-six correct tickets and 15% to five-of-six consolations. The requested new structure will be 70 percent to six-of-six ticket holders, 15% to five-of-six, and “the remaining 15% will go into a single-ticket jackpot pool, so in the event that there is one single, unique winning ticket, that amount will be paid off as well as the 70% six-of-six major pool,” Rubinstein said.
That's similar to a jackpot model that has been successful at Gulfstream Park and at Maryland tracks, Rubinstein noted.
Joe Harper, DMTC's president and chief executive officer, said that even though the upcoming race meet has five fewer dates than 2015, Del Mar should not have to struggle to fill races on opening weekend, like it did last season when the start of the meet coincided with the BC at Keeneland Race Course.
Robbins said that with BC officials already in southern California on a regular basis to prepare for the Nov. 4-5 championships at Santa Anita, they have been able to spend time at Del Mar to do early site planning for the temporary structures that will need to be erected for next year's inaugural hosting of the BC at Del Mar.
“We're far down that road, and in fact [BC officials] were present at Del Mar Monday in terms of where those locations will be and the space that they will take up,” Robbins said.
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