Del Mar Releases Stakes Schedule

DEL MAR, Calif. (Apr. 15, 2015) — Del Mar’s summertime 40-day meeting will feature 43 stakes events, topped by the $1,000,000 TVG Pacific Classic and worth a total of $7,950,000 in black-type purses. The historic track will present its bountiful slate during its 76th season of seaside sport starting on Thursday, July 16 and running through Labor Day Monday, September 7.

The track’s 33 major, or “advertised,” stakes will carry purses ranging from $100,000 to the $1-million Classic, which will be presented on Saturday, August 22, while its 10 “overnight” stakes each will be worth $80,000. Additionally, the racing headquarters “where the turf meets the surf” will provide its horsemen with purses of more than $650,000 a day, the richest output in the state of California and among the most lucrative of any race meeting in America.

The TVG Pacific Classic, first presented at the shore oval in 1991, will have its silver anniversary 25th edition this year, run at its classic distance of a mile and one quarter and open to 3-year-olds and up. Last year’s winner of the west’s richest race for older horses was the stellar handicap star Shared Belief.

All told, the track will offer 21 Graded stakes – seven of them Grade I, 10 at Grade II and four at Grade III.

Twenty three of the track’s stakes will be run on its newly renovated main track, which – after a seven-year period of racing on a synthetic surface called by the brand name Polytrack – has been returned to dirt over this past winter. The new surface is the well-regarded “El Segundo sand,” the same material Santa Anita racetrack used in its remake of its main track. The remaining 20 stakes on the Del Mar roster will be presented on its turf course, which was planted anew and expanded for the start of the 2014 summer season.

The TVG Pacific Classic will headline a stakes tripleheader Saturday that also will feature a pair of $250,000 Grade II presentations – the seven-furlong Pat O’Brien Stakes and the 11-furlong Del Mar Handicap on grass. Overall, there will be nine different afternoons when at least two stakes will be decided.

“We’re excited to have eight weeks of racing at Del Mar this summer,” noted track president and CEO Joe Harper. “And as usual, our racing office has put together a terrific stakes schedule that holds the promise of some marvelously competitive racing.”

After its start on a Thursday, the track will ease into its recent pattern of five-day race weeks with programs on Wednesday through Sunday for the balance of the session, capped by a close on Labor Day Monday. First post daily is 2 p.m. with the exceptions of Fridays when the popular “Four O’Clock Friday” cards (which include a post-race concert) are in vogue and a 4 p.m. start happens.

Del Mar’s executive vice president for racing Tom Robbins and racing secretary David Jerkens have tweaked this year’s stakes schedule slightly. Of foremost note is the bolstering of the Grade I Eddie Read Stakes (Saturday, July 18) at nine furlongs on grass from $300,000 to $400,000. Also hiked was the track’s venerable Del Mar Handicap (the only stakes that has been run every year since the track opened in 1937) from $200,000 to $250,000. Additionally, two of the track’s stakes – a pair of one mile turf races for 2-year-olds – have been renamed as the Del Mar Juvenile Turf (Saturday, September 5) and the Del Mar Juvenile Fillies Turf (Monday, September 7).

“We believe Del Mar has once again put together an extremely attractive stakes program for our horsemen,” said Thoroughbred Owners of California chairman Mike Pegram. “Del Mar is offering a good balance of stakes and overnight races, giving owners many options to look forward to.”

The jumping off point in the stakes parade will be the popular opening day Oceanside Stakes at a mile on the grass for 3-year-olds. This will be the 70th running of the race that kicks off the track’s 3-year-old grass series (followed by the La Jolla Handicap and the Del Mar Derby) and its prominence is underscored by the fact that in its 34 runnings since 1981 it has been divided no fewer than 27 times.

Five of Del Mar’s stakes once again have been designated Breeders’ Cup “Win and You’re In” races, meaning a guaranteed starting spot as well as payment of all fees for corresponding Breeders’ Cup races will be earned by their winners. Those races are the Grade I, $300,000 Bing Crosby Stakes (Sunday, July 26); the Grade I, $300,000 Clement L. Hirsch Stakes (Saturday, August 1); the Pat O’Brien Stakes; the Del Mar Handicap and the TVG Pacific Classic.

Besides the robust stakes program, the track also will offer an overnight purse schedule that horsemen should find especially pleasing. First-level allowance races will have pots of $72,000 and straight maiden races will offer $70,000 incentives. Even the track’s lowest selling races for $8,000 claimers will provide $19,000 in prize money.

“I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again,” said racing vice president Robbins, “there’s money to be made at Del Mar. Our local horsemen know that and we want horsemen from across the country to realize it, too. We’ve got a new main track and a wider and better turf course to present our product on and we believe we’re going to have a terrific summer of high-class horse racing.”

Following its summer stand, Del Mar will return once again for a second consecutive “fall” racing season with 20 days of sport planned between Thursday, October 29 and Sunday, November 29.

The complete list of summer stakes follows: