A great day for the sport.

[brianwspencer]

Originally Posted by Dahoss

It's Saratoga also. The million dollar question is how to make it happen at more places. How do we convince everyone else what a great time our sport is to watch and participate in? How can we show them they are missing out if they aren't there?

I don't have the answer but it feels like educating them about the game further can only help. Horses racing longer, so people actually can follow a horses career for more than a few months will help.

There's no way to post this without sounding like a shameless self-promoter, but at least there were some efforts made with regards to educating people who were there outside of the info that can be gathered from the NYRA feed with Andy, Maggie, etc.

America's Best Racing sponsored a fan education area with Horse Player NOW, and we wound up with two sets of teams to do the kind of fan education that at least helps casual bettors feel like they aren't just randomly picking horses and betting against themselves.

One area inside for foot traffic in the plant, and another out back by the wagering pavilion, and we saw some of the same people who found us in the Preakness infield just a few weeks earlier when we hosted a tent there with the Daily Racing Form.

It's remarkable, really, just how little help many of these people need to get even the most cursory handle on things. Lots of these casual, big event, fans are sharper than I/we give them credit for, but if they don't know where to start, they're going to get lost in the shuffle. It's all about logistics and money, for sure, but I know from firsthand experience at Pimlico the last three years and at Belmont Saturday that these kind of casual bettors CAN be turned into more serious players. It's not easy, but it's possible.

It really was a great day there, and the energy was surprisingly positive given the scratch of IHA.