Lincoln State Fair Park
 

Don't know if anyone bets this track or not out of Nebraska but the inside rail has been deadly the first two days. If you would of bet $2 to w/p on horses 1,2,3 on each race you would of more than doubled your money. Just a FYI for everyone. Take a look at the results for the first couple of days and you will see what I mean.

Speed on the Rail............
 

Been to this track many a day and the title of this e-mail remains true. The track is 5/8 mile and the stretch is 600 feet. Awfully hard to make up any ground if you fall to far behind. Classic bullring. Horses have a little better chance closing at a mile or longer but they must get in gear before approaching the final turn. Profitable move here has been to look for shippers from bigger tracks that have early speed but been stopping, here they can last for nice payoffs or be a factor in the exotics.

Ak-Sar-Ben!

I used to have to go to Lincoln for work one week every summer and would always hit State Fair Park. The rule was that regardless of the distance, whatever horse had the lead after two jumps always won. It was easy money...

Paul

Oh, the good old days.............
 

That picture brings a tear to my eye.........in 1985 Ak-Sar-Ben averaged a little over 13,000 people per day and on Saturdays people would come in busses from KC, Des Moines and Sioux City. I believe the record for Greyhounds in the parking lot was 27. Two years later the place was a graveyard and now provides student housing for the Univ of Nebraska at Omaha. Jack Van Berg and Don Von Hemmel were kings. Those were the days........

1985 was when I went to Ak-Sar-Ben for the only time. I was living in Kansas City and my pal Phil came to visit and we road-tripped up to Omaha. I was working for Procter & Gamble at the time and stopped and made a sales call on the way at a truck stop in Mound City (!).

Ak-Sar-Ben was a great surprise to us, and we had a great day winning about $250-300 each. We went to Johnny's by the Yards for steaks afterwards too. Was a day I won't forget... Just great.

What happened in the late 80's to cause it's downfall? I used to go to Omaha on business a lot in the early 90s and knew of it but never got there.

Causes of the demise.............
 

Basically a few things happened.............Council Bluffs, IA (directly across Missouri River) got the jump on Omaha with the Iowa legislature approving gambling. Bluffs Run dog track was built and the action was quicker and a novelty at the time. Also, other tracks began to spring up in KC (Woodlands) and Des Moines (Prairie Meadows). This siphoned off some of the business but the real problem was when Iowa also let slots into the dog tracks and other forms of gaming were permitted. Nebraska voted down allowing slots and even had an offer from Churchill Downs to take over the operations IF they could put slots on the premises. This again was voted down. The mayor of Council Bluffs was also very progressive and took advantage of every opportunity to enhance his city while Omaha's just stood idly by. Handle decreased significantly every year after that and then the economic problems led to the sale of the property. Another factor that contributed (in my opinion) was that Ak-Sar-Ben had a bit of an attitude thinking that they were indestructable. Customer service was not one of their strong suits and people became disenchanted. It all happened quite quickly. It still amazes me that the city let it go.................the economic impact to the city when the summer racing season was running had to be huge.

Omaha now has a very nice OTB facility named Horsemen's Park which has a 5/8th's mile oval and races 4 days a year. State law in Nebraska requires at least a day of "live" racing once a year in order to have a simulcast facility. These 4 days of racing actually get some nice attendance from the locals. This year the race dates are July 17-20.

The "real" Cornhusker Handicap belongs to Ak-Sar-Ben not Prairie Meadows!!

Bob,

2 things happened with Ak-Sar-ben in 1986 that began its' decline. It was sold to the the County and Bluff's Run Dog Track opened. Poor management by the new operating team and the loss of turnstile/handle from the year-round greyhound facility began to take a toll and the quality of racing declined markedly over the next 10 years until the closure in 1995.

AK-SAR-BEN website:
http://www.ak-sar-ben.com/

Yummy...............
 

Now my mouth is watering...............Johnny's at the stockyards was a superb classic steakhouse. Two more of the most famous were Ross' and Anthony's both on the same street as Ak-Sar-Ben. Mound City (Home of the Honkers) was a standard stop on my visits to KC or coming back from there.

I always used to go to Ross'..couldn't afford it, but still had to have it.

thnx to you and Steve for the details...Omaha is a pretty conservative town and it caught up with them