By Bloodhorse.com
ARCADIA, Calif. (Mar. 12, 2019) — Santa Anita Park‘s main track opened March 11 for jogging and galloping, the first time horses were allowed onto it in nearly a week. Workouts resumed on the training track the same morning.
Monday also marked the first day that Santa Anita’s new safety protocols were implemented. Horsemen had to submit forms the previous day if they wanted to work horses on the training track.
Tim Ritvo, chief operating officer of The Stronach Group, watched the training from Clockers’ Corner. He said that trainers had applied for 150 horses to work on the training track.
“We flagged about 12 of those horses and asked the trainers not to work those horses this morning,” Ritvo said.
Criteria used to flag horses were those that had been away from the races for an extended period of time and hadn’t worked in the past 120 days, said Ritvo.
“We got full cooperation with that,” he said. “Everybody said they completely understood. I think it’s the beginning of hopefully all working together. It just felt good.”
Santa Anita has brought on some temporary additional veterinary help, including Dr. Robert O’Neil, who works for The Stronach Group and typically is based at Gulfstream Park. Ritvo said Santa Anita would soon be hiring permanent people for the expanded protocols.
Also to be determined is whether Los Alamitos Race Course and San Luis Rey Downs would be brought under the auspices of these protocols, since they are part of the approved stabling areas for the Santa Anita meeting.
Ritvo met with track consultant Dennis Moore the morning of March 11 to see how the analysis of the track was proceeding.
“Step one was to look at the base, to make sure there’s no erosion,” Ritvo said. “The second thing is the soil analysis. The last thing is, ‘is it even everywhere?'”
Ritvo said Moore was pleased with how the track was progressing. Santa Anita management will monitor the jogging and galloping on the main track for a couple of days, and Ritvo said that works over that surface might be allowed again by March 13 or 14. Racing has been tentatively set to resume March 22.
“We’re thankful that the horsemen are looking at everything that they do too and all of their practices and how we can all be more cautious,” Ritvo added. “Because the truth of the matter is we’re in this all together.”
Going forward, Santa Anita management is discussing whether to cancel racing when rain requires the track to be sealed.
“I’m leaning on if it’s really bad and the track’s sealed really tight, then we may just go with canceling,” he said. “We have to address that when it comes up.”
Ritvo pointed out that tracks on the East Coast have to cancel in the winter because of snow.
“If we seal the track and we’re not happy with it, and it’s too tight, those may end up becoming (California’s) snow days,” he said.