San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Trainers ponder move to Cal Expo, not racing in L.A.
The Stronach Group’s bombshell announcement this past week that it would close Golden Gate Fields at the end of the track’s fall season doesn’t necessarily mean the end of thoroughbred racing in Northern California.
But it likely does mean a move 75 miles east to Cal Expo in Sacramento, where the California Authority of Racing Fairs is proposing to replace Golden Gate Fields’ racing dates — pending approval of the California Horse Racing Board.
“Our position is that we’ll take over racing, and Cal Expo is the hub,” said CARF Executive Director Larry Swartzlander. “There are 1,040 stalls at Cal Expo and they have between 900 and 1,000 horses at Golden Gate at any one time. We have the capacity. And we’ll put in a turf course.”
An early plan to be presented to the CHRB’s racing dates committee Aug. 16 would see Cal Expo operate thoroughbred racing on a schedule similar to that at Golden
“We have a lot of people we care about, and we can’t just abandon them. This is going to
hurt a lot of people.”
Ellen Lee Jackson, former trainer at Golden Gate Fields
over to real estate developers. Golden Gate Fields, which opened in 1941 on the BerkeleyAlbany border, has served as the region’s only major track since then.
People who work in the industry — which is already under scrutiny for a spate of horse deaths, including 12 this spring at Churchill Downs, home of the Kentucky Derby — hope racing officials will find a way to extend meets at the summer fair sites. But there’s no guarantee that will happen, and either way it could prove challenging for trainers to keep their horses in Northern California without enough racing dates.
That leaves workers, like Silva, anxious about what happens next. He previously lived in Manteca and drove nearly 150 miles round trip, six days a week, to Golden Gate Fields. Silva recently moved his family, including his wife Atenas and their 14-year-old daughter Sabine, into an apartment in San Ramon, where they signed a one-year lease.
The lease has 11 months left, but he doesn’t know if he can stay beyond December. Silva enjoys working for Wright and loves horses — just being around them, he said, brightens his mood.
“It’s like therapy for me,” Silva said. “It calms me down. … This is my life.”
It’s also the life of trainers such as Wright, who followed his late dad Richard into the business. Wright runs two stables, one near his home in suburban
Seattle with 42 horses and the one here. He added the Bay Area operation in 2010, because 5 ½ months of racing in Washington state didn’t generate enough income.
Wright, like other trainers interviewed by The Chronicle, sounded skeptical about The Stronach Group’s plan to prop up Southern California racing by shutting down Golden Gate Fields. Most of the horses living and racing here, the trainers explained, aren’t accomplished enough to compete at Santa Anita.
Wright figures only six to eight of his 35 Bay Area horses could race in Southern California, calling it “just a different class of horses.” Ellen Lee Jackson, a trainer at Golden Gate Fields until her retirement earlier this month, said she was told about 65 of the track’s 1,000 horses realistically could make the move south.
Even so, the closure will have a significant impact on the industry.
“Santa Anita is the major leagues, and Golden Gate Fields is college, Triple-A and Double-A combined,” Wright said. “If you take that away, your system will fail. It may not happen in a year and it may not happen in two years, but it will happen.”
Wright expects to get out of racing if there’s no track in Northern California to train horses. He could move his Bay Area business to Southern California or Arizona, but there’s no assurance he would be able to make it work financially.
More likely, he would sell his equipment, disband his stable and return to Seattle to figure out a new career.
Wright worries more about his crew landing other jobs and making ends meet. He praised employees such as Silva for their work ethic, including arriving at the track before dawn each morning, and their deep attachment to the horses.
Jackson, who also breeds racehorses at her 63-acre farm in Vacaville, went on a letter-writing spree after the news broke about Golden Gate Fields. She wrote to Gov. Gavin Newsom, the state office of business and economic development and the California Horse Racing Board, mostly lobbying to delay the track’s closure and give people more time to find jobs and housing.
“We have a lot of people we care about, and we can’t just abandon them,” Jackson said. “This is going to hurt a lot of people. They don’t know which way to look or which avenue to pursue. That’s why I’m trying to convince people to band together and stand up for what’s right.”
“The industry is built on the backs of these Hispanic people. They do all the work, they love the horses and they’re such dedicated employees.”
Jackson and others in the industry were not exactly comforted by The Stronach Group’s statement accompanying the announcement. In a news release, Belinda Stronach, the company’s president and CEO, was quoted as saying she recognized the “profound effects” the decision would have on owners, trainers, jockeys and stable personnel. Stronach pledged to work with the CHRB and other industry groups to “develop a plan to relocate horses and employees to SoCal while supporting all affected by the closure.”
A Stronach Group spokesperson declined a request to interview Belinda Stronach or another company executive, referring The Chronicle to her statement in the news release.
Similarly, the CHRB did not make top officials available for interviews. Executive Director Scott Chaney, in a statement also released last Sunday, said, “I am acutely aware of the human impact of the closure … and I will be working hard to ameliorate any negative consequences and create job opportunities.”
In the meantime, those most affected by the news wait and wonder, hoping the next CHRB meeting — Aug. 16-17 in Del Mar (San Diego County) — offers some clues. The summer fair season will lead into more racing at Golden Gate Fields, from Aug. 26 to Oct. 2, on Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays) and again from Oct. 20 to Dec. 10. Beyond that, nobody knows. William Antongeorgi III, one of the track’s leading jockeys — with more than 1,600 career wins — since coming from Southern California eight years ago, expects Cal Expo in Sacramento
to become the main hub for Northern California racing. That would help, but still bring complications. Antongeorgi isn’t wild about commuting from his home in Livermore to Sacramento, and he’s not sure if he would move his family given the uncertainty about the future.
“If they don’t get racing dates, I’d be looking at a place to go (another track) with our family or go by myself for a while,” he said. “It’s big stress for a guy with a family, and even for a single guy. You have to start all over unless you have a barn behind you.”
Or, as trainer Bill McLean bluntly put it, “It’s horrible. They don’t give you any warning: It’s kind of a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.”
That leaves stable workers such as Silva, who knows no life outside of horses, reluctantly contemplating their options. He could try to find a new trainer to hire him in Southern California, but he’s hesitant to uproot his family again after the move from Manteca to San Ramon.
Silva aspires to become a trainer, like his grandpa, dad and brother. He’s accustomed to filling multiple roles at the track, hustling to pay the bills. And he’s not the only one.
“I have a bunch of friends who are going to lose everything,” Silva said. “They have double work (two jobs) like me, and they’re very worried. Everybody is trying to look for another opportunity.”