Rachel, handle, exposure... it's all there

[pointman]

Originally Posted by MisterB

And you couldn't find 500 people at the track after the one day wonder. People talk about bringing the young into the sport?? With over 50 years in this sport, I can say it's soon disappearing in the rear view mirror.

Could care less about the pot smokers, beer bongs, and potty runners.

The sport is not dying, people have to stop buying into this. I don't know the exact number, but when you count the total attendance of every racetrack around the country on any given day, racing still draws a ton of fans and likely more than the combined attendance of any other single sport attending a live event on a given day. The ban on bringing liquor into the infield is the primary factor in the reduction of attendance at Pimlico this year, however, the obvious conclusion is that those that didn't attend don't really pump much money into the handle anyway.

Then, when you factor the ease of placing bets over the internet from your living room couch, it becomes clear that the dynamics are simply changing and the sport must (and has been) adjust to it. I still love taking in a day at the races, but I don't go to the track as much even though I am 20 minutes from Belmont and Aqueduct simply because I really enjoy going to my couch and enjoying a day "at" the races on a large flat screen television. The sport will be fine going forward.