BC can't answer handle figs honestly: "It's the field size, stupid"

[Travis Stone]

Honestly, I'm torn on this whole two-day front. Here are a few random thoughts...

Two days makes it an event - a weekend - a reason for people to fly in one day early to be a part of it. For those who have attended, two days is oddly a bit more relaxing because on Friday you seem to say, "Well, there's always tomorrow."

Also, the revenue generated on two days will never be achieved with just one day. Even if you shift races, horseplayers still come to the event/weekend with a finite amount of money to spend. If you eliminate BC races, the simulcast market is still going to spend whatever money they brought for the smaller BC Friday card but not spend it necessarily on the host track, but the entire market as a whole. That is a bad go for the BC because of their pricing in the simulcast market and what they can demand.

Races like the dirt mile are a little goofy but it's a catch-all and thus far it has not ruined the Classic. Plus, it's definitely more "betable" than the Marathon and it's easier to form an opinion on than the Turf Sprint. So it's kind of needed to help keep things together and give the card some wagering structure.

I think we all have a mental block over the "championship" title for these races. Truthfully, it's just window dressing. Calling the Marathon or JFT a championship is silly, and I'm sure most would agree, but to make the event make sense for fringe fans and general society you need something they can relate to. It's one of those things us horseplayers need to probably say, "Well, it's not, but who cares and oh well."

The primary problem I think the BC needs to quickly address is field size. Simply put, field size drives handle. Seven horses in the Turf? That's horrendous. F&M Turf, too. Those two fields cannot be blamed on a watered-down BC product at all. The Sprint? Yeah, you could make a case... but for the amount of Sprint racing we have in America, filling that gate seems like it would be easy, no? The BC is putting-up way too much money for the sized fields they're getting of late.

So that leads you to questions like is racing watering its product down too much leading into the event? Are there too many preps which "over-filter" the fields? But that's a different thread.