Tim they already have slots legislation and indeed will be kicking butt sometime soon.
I know thats hard to believe but its gonna happen with the slots money.
Its easier for me to believe that then it is that Gulf is suddenly gonna boost purses and start running races that horseman wanna run in.
It was an absolute joke the last two years there, and even longer than that.
They have a HUGE pool of very expensive an classy horses to draw from down there and refused to utilize it.
Some gamblers may not mind claiming races but guys who drop hundreds of thousands of dollars or millions on horses who don't have spots to run in do mind, they mind a great deal.
For anyone who wants to question the quality of the product down there recently all you have to do is pull the results from last year and check out the nauseating cards on all weekdays and most Sundays.
They packaged a bunch of stakes races on a few days(many at graded stakes level committe minimum purse money for that grade, ahem cough cough) in an attempt to try and fool people into thinkiing it was still a great product. Its not. You need to give horsemen a chance to run allowance runners and maidens in proper spots.
As one guy told me, the racing secretary is not a horse trainer, yet due to the lack of spots available for them to run higher class horses in, hes acting as one by basically giving you no options on where to run your horse.
Oaklawn flourished last year and will flourish again this year. Even though there is no grass course, they card decent races with good purses.
Same with Aqueduct's inner. Big purse money and places to run your horses.
Fair Grounds should have a good base as well.