Having a major race day on a Saturday has no direct correlation to handle performance on Sunday.

Here are the Sunday handles for Sunday's in May on a national level...

5/2/10 - 45,330,842
5/9/10 - 42,532,055
5/16/10 - 44,348,464
5/23/10 - 44,039,399
5/30/10 - 48,772,526

Sunday's typically handle less than Friday's believe it or not. Handle on Sunday is less than the corresponding Thursday more than you might think as well.

The point is Sunday is a quiet day reserved for hardcore players, die hards and the regulars.

The only Sunday after a big race day where I've seen a busier than usual on-track crowd is the day after Derby. In that case, the Derby serves as a good marketing vehicle the day before and creates added interest.

Belmont closing is no where close to the wrong move. They're not passing-up any unusual chance for a big day. And when you factor in employee morale after a big day and long week, it makes more sense.

Besides, who has any money left after Champagne d'Oro, Winchester and Drosselmeyer all win?

That is simply not true. You will get far more casual players money having a 4 day lead in. That is a lot of time to promote the carryover, for people to handicap the races and for syndicates to form. The fact is that they had no idea if they were going have a carryover. There is just no demand for the day after the Belmont. Based on the numbers there wasnt a huge demand for Belmont day, let alone the next day. And comparing Saratoga and Belmont is folly. They get 15k on the Sunday before the meet even starts. Complaining about something like this is petty.

Yeah and there are still 5 times more people there than there would be at Belmont on Sunday. LOL!

Of course this is all just a matter of opinion but Travers day and its undercard usually matchup pretty well to Belmont day's card. The difference is that Saratoga averages upwards of 25k people on Sundays and Belmont averages about 5k.

no doubt it's a nice card, but is it 13 races? at any rate, i can understand taking off the day after an undertaking like that. and between spring and fall, belmont won't miss a sunday card, whereas i'd think saratoga would.

They usually have at least 12.

There was no question. Reread the first post. It is a criticism that most here have proven is unfounded.

You aren't a newbie based on your other posts so surely you realize your contrarian attitude based on your dislike of "the way it has always been done thinking" is not valid since not running on the Sunday following the Belmont is a relatively new idea.

Come on Marty, How many casual fans do you think are playing the pick 6? While those people might have enjoyed a nice day at Belmont on Sunday, they aren't the ones putting a ton of money into the pools. If you are a player/fan, Saturday was your day. And after watching and betting that card all day Saturday, I'm sure the last thing people wanted to do was pick up a form and have to cap for a monsterous carryover the next day.
Not to mention all the work that had to been done around the faculity after their biggest day of the year.
Just wait till Wednesday, the carryover will still be their and so will the people who intend to bet it.

In the past, NYRA has run on the day after the Belmont but this year they chose not to. I am not sure of the reasons but my guess would be, in no particular order:
Many huge crowd days when a TC was on the line (they had no idea when presenting the state with their calendar if a TC would be on the line) Cleanup after 100k patron day is a nightmare.

The fact they Memorial Day was the prior Monday AND they added Wed to the week. Usually Wed after a Monday holiday is dark.

The fact that MON has been a horse drain for them and filling good races has been tough.

Comparing Saratoga to Belmont is pointless. Fans would show up at Saratoga if they ran 9 New Jersey bred mule races.


The carryover is irrelevant. There was no way to know that there would be a carryover. In fact, I'd guess just by my recent play on big NYRA days (Belmont, JCGC etc) that more often it's a chalky P6. It's not like, at 7pm on Sat that they could suddenly get a card slated for Sunday because of the C/O. Having the few extra days should have been helpful to bettors and the casual fans that might have added to the ranks on Sunday were probably not playing the P6 anyhow.

NYRA had (realistically speaking) run too many races over the last two weeks between the holiday weekend cards and the 10 and 13 race days on Fr and Sat. They needed the break.

yes its 12 - 13 races of equal or better quality

but I dont think people can compare Saratoga's attendance to anywhere else.. simply a different (and better) breed!

Do you think that the people who run NYRA didn't take these things into consideration? That someone just flippantly said "hey i'm having a big post Belmont party so we shouln't run on Sunday"?

Or are you just playing the contrarian card in an attempt to make yourself look smarter than everyone else?

There were several reasons given.
1. Cleanup after the big event
2. NYRA having run 10 cards in 11 days.
3. Employees worked unusually long hours on Saturday
4. Hangover effect after big days that other venues have chosen to skip
5. Travis showed that there was no handle bump after the derby or preakness showing that they weren't missing out on an unusually good day of racing.

other potential reasons
6. union wages are cheaper on weekdays
7. potential of a carryover is greater due to the nature of the belmont card and only Gales will argue that leadup time isn't better in these situations

Perhaps these reasons arent good enough for you guys but i find it hard to believe that anyone thinks that taking Sunday off wasn't a good idea.

I just don't think that anyone is giving consideration to the people that work at the track either. This is their biggest day of the year. Gates opened at (I believe 8:30) for a 11:35 first post. The last race went off at 7:50. It's not like they shut the lights off and go home at 8 o'clock after the last race goes official. I'm thinking that many people were there very late that night, cleaning up after such a big day. Most likely after working there for the entire day. All this coming in a span where they raced 10 times in 11 days.

But then again if they did put together a card for Sunday for the sake of just racing for a 11th time in 12 days and it came up below par, people would have chastised NYRA for not anticipating a carryover. Then they would have bitched and moaned about the crappy card that they would be looking at for such a big carryover.

It just seems like some people like to bitch and moan reguardless of what goes on there.

It's the racing fan way.