Originally Posted by todko

I totally appreciate it. Totally.

It's perhaps the best way to bring new money into racing. America has gambling/venture fever and horse ownership through partnerships/consortium/clubs/syndication or whatever you wish to call it is one of the avenues the industry should publicize. It could potentially draw billions to racing and revitalize the sport.

It's a hell of a lot more interesting than owning stock.

One of my gripes with poly has been the cost and that maybe that money should have been better spent on advertising. Increasing field size does not add to the sport -- it does not draw any new money to the game. It merely reallocates money between tracks.

The general non-horseracing public could care less whether you have Polytrack, Cushion Track, Tapeta, dirt, or turf. They don't even know there's a track to begin with let alone what surface the horses run on.

Take Cincinnati for instance. Throw some cheap TV and newspaper commercials showing people who have won $10k or so at Turfway or River Downs. That will immediately draw NEW customers to the track. People want to gamble -- they want to win money -- and the best way to get them to the track is to talk about winnings.

Show the public a person who won $100,000 or so at Turfway and you'll have many new customers. Most people in this area don't even know horse racing exists let alone that you can win money at it.

Show 'em on TV. Holding up a big check. Saying, "I'm Joe Blow and I went to Turfway last Saturday and I came home with $140,000". Pretty simple but effective.

Getting new customers to the track will save racing. If you don't do that -- you'll have empty grandstands facing a poly surface instead of a dirt surface.