President & General Manager
Remington Park
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| Welcome Back! |
It must be Spring because there are horses at Remington Park! That’s what I kept telling myself this morning, and it really did feel like springtime as I walked the RP stable area this morning. We just opened the stable area yesterday and by noon today there were already nearly 500 horses on the grounds and more coming in every few minutes. We had 3,400 applications for our 1,400 stalls, so people are understandably eager to get their stables moved in and set up. It was so great seeing all the beautiful horses, all full of energy and ready to run. It was a busy morning on the racetrack but not nearly as busy as it will be in another 7-10 days when every stall will be occupied.
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| GR Carter image via Dutstin Orna Photography |
One of the first people I ran into
was G.R. Carter, who just won his TENTH World Champion Quarter Horse Jockey
title—the most ever by anyone. GR is one
of the greatest athletes and one of the best all-around guys you’ll ever meet
and he couldn’t say enough about how excited he was to get the 2013 RP racing season underway (March 8). He was full
of praise for the quality of the racing surface. Think about it. If you were a jockey, hurtling down the
straightaway at 55 mph, you’d want to be racing on the safest possible
surface. Here at Remington Park we spend
more than $1.5 million each year just taking care of those two ovals (one dirt,
one grass) to make sure we provide the safest surface possible. As a lifelong horse owner, horse trainer and
racetrack executive, nothing is more important to me than safety and I’m very proud
of the lengths we go to at RP to ensure the highest standards. We employ ground-penetrating radar, all kinds
of impact measurement devices, plus super complex soil particle analyses from
the nation’s leading laboratories. Plus,
we employ not only our own talented on-site team but we also pay the world’s
most renowned experts to analyze and test our racing surfaces throughout the
year. Dr. Mick Peterson of MIT and
Dennis Moore, widely recognized as the world’s leading expert on racetrack
surfaces, have both given our current surface their blessing as being one of
the finest in the nation. So that’s one
less thing for me to worry about!
Another sure fire Hall of Famer I
visited with was Sleepy Gilbreath, trainer of last year’s Remington
Championship winner Cold Cash 123 and the sport’s all-time money-winning horse,
Ochoa. Sleepy assures me that Ochoa will
be making his first-ever Remington Park appearance here soon, so keep your eye
out for the announcement of that date.
Although I’ve never seen him run except for on TV, most experts agree
that Ochoa may be “The Fastest Horse on the Planet.” Some even say he’s “The Fastest Horse of All
Time.” How exciting that we’ll get to
see him defend his reputation right here at Remington Park in the near future.
In the meantime, this is sort of
like the NFL Combine, where the rookies all get tested by the pro teams. In our case, our “rookies” (the 2-year-olds)
will begin racing in Training Races on Feb. 14, to take place on most
Wednesdays throughout February and March.
Our Training Races have produced some legendary stars through the years
and this year will be no exception.
American Quarter Horses are indeed The World’s Fastest Athletes and
there’s no better place to see them than at Remington Park. Come out and see us! And if you see me, come up and introduce
yourself—I love showing people around and sharing my inside knowledge of the
sport with whomever cares to listen!
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| See you soon. |
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