All Weather track thought could this work
 

I was thinking about this the other night and I am not sure that this is even a viable option. Lets Take Aqueduct for instance I think this could be the perfect place to maybe implement this thought. Why could you not take the inner track and turn it into one of the All weather surfaces that is out there. and Leave the main track as it is. That way in th Dead of winter u could strickly use the all weather surface. But here is my thought as the weather breaks why could you not card races on both the main track and the all weather track. that way horsemen could have the best of both worlds. As you guys know there are trainer's out there that love the artifical stuff and others who would like to stick to the traditional dirt surface. PLus the benefit in the AM training you could have the choice of training on either surface.


PLus turf races when taken off the lawn would have the option of MAin track or All Weather. Another advantage if you had a main track that has had a tremedous amount of rain and is very sloppy, muddy they could be switched to the All weather track.

Anythoughts out there could this possibly work or is it just a pipe dream

It could work and I imagine will be implemented somewhere in the near future.

Sounds like a cluster**** waiting to happen, but at least someone is thinking outside of the box on this issue. If that ever happened, personally I would hope they wouldn't alternate races between main and AWT. That would make multi-race wagers impossible for those of us who choose not to bet on AWT races.

It makes perfect sense..... which unfortunately may be a problem.

The only problem I could see is that you need a different mix of the synthetic based on whether you're running on it in the cold (like AQ would) vs. when you'd take a grass race off after the weather breaks.
If you don't use the correct mix, it balls up in the horse's hooves, making it like running on a skating rink.

Would make handicapping impossible. . .

Why?

and the jocks cant be babys and not ride...wont happen...

They'll still find a way to be babies and not ride. I wouldn't worry about that.

With all the surface switches. . .

It would have to be a lot simpler but it wouldn't be any different than it is now. Just set it so all off the turf races go to the synthetic. Dirt stays on the dirt.

Personally I would much rather bet a race on the turf and then have it moved to the synthetic than onto the dirt.

Not for off the turf and stuff like that - that would be easier - but for horses who raced on one surface and are switching to another. It's bad enough trying to cap horses going between Churchill and Keeneland. The three surfaces at one track would get VERY confusing. It's not that bad of an idea - but it would suck for us handicappers.

I really don't think it would be as bad as you think. Personally I love to handicap and bet a race where a horse is moving from dirt to synthetic or synthetic to dirt and has nothing to suggest they will do well with the transition. And I'd be a million times more happy with a multi-race wager in bad weather if I knew that in the worst case that they would move the turf race to a synthetic instead of the dirt. I think it could be more of a benefit to handicappers than they want to realize. Joey wants to be stubborn with his "I choose to not bet these AWT surfaces" but at the same time he's a very good capper that could totally capitalize off of these surface changes where many others can't.

Ultimately though, it all comes down to if there is a demand for synthetics then I would much rather see the trend be to have all three surfaces at one track than the joke scenario now at so many places where they only have a turf and synthetic turf course.