JONES: New horse racing track having a bet on success of accompanying casino to fill purses and stands

It changed into 8 a.M. On April Fools’ Day, while the new Century Mile complicated called the Edmonton media to submit for the professional opening of the simplest mile-distance horse racing track West of Woodbine. The question turned into always going to be: ‘If they construct it, will they come?’ Well, they constructed it. And they, as a minimum, come to the online casino. After 118-years of horse racing at the website online that became Northlands Park, the reputable establishing of the blended casino-horse racing facility overlooks the Red Tail Landing golf route to the East off QEII toll road, with the Edmonton International Airport to the West.

That’s a long drive to make a $2 bet. But the huge wager concerned with the new facility is that the online casino will be so successful that the purse structure for the horse racing will upward thrust dramatically with it. With that, the pony populace will develop, after which the crowds will come. Monday morning, a purple carpet was stretched at the front of the building. Guests were greeted through plumed, Las Vegas-fashion showgirls and a 3-piece band. As you entered, it was the same sensation provided in any of the Glitter Gulch casinos in Sin City with definitely no trace whatsoever there would possibly, certainly, be a horse race tune obtainable someplace.

At the ground place to be converted into a multi-track having a betting parlor similar to that at Uplinks at Northlands, the place was set up with chairs arranged for a press conference. When the speeches by using diverse dignitaries concluded, all of us in attendance became given a flute of champagne and a toast to the subsequent one hundred years of horse racing in the Alberta turned into made. Everybody then trooped outside for the professional ribbon cutting. Then the doors opened, and the online casino crammed. Casino hours pass from nine:30 a.M. To three a.M., and if Day 1 becomes any indication with a busy casino and both parking masses – providing seven-hundred paved and seven hundred unpaved stalls packed through a great deal of the day – it turned into a top-notch launch for that part of the operation.

You needed to pass as much as the second one ground or outdoor to the apron to get any feeling that you have also been at a racetrack. And it became quite clear at once that that is going to be a first-rate adjustment.
A steady movement of horses became having morning workout routines. For those used to the ‘bull ring’ tracks, like Northland Park or Hastings Park in Vancouver, it will possibly seem like the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. But you’re not right on top of it. And without the tight turns, you surprise about the exhilaration that might be lost. There’s additionally the feeling that everyone is hermetically sealed in a large box above the online casino ground in reality forced to observe on video boards the identical appeal that’s happening live right in the front of you.

It doesn’t have any antique-time racetrack sense in any respect. There’s a 408-seat eating place set-up wherein tables for 6 are arranged so no person can see the whole tune — 3 humans dealing with Turns 1 & 2, and 3 going through Turns 3 & 4. All the tables are located in front of windows which are all separated using beams. Large television screens line the length of the room above the home windows. There is also any other 150-seat setup with a paddock view and the simplest 300 seats in an outdoor grandstand. It’s enormously difficult to photograph wherein they’d put 10,000 humans for a Canadian Derby even if there takes place to be a large apron among the casino building and the rail.

It’s additionally hard to imagine what the track will appear like when the horses enter the beginning gate for Opening Day of the thoroughbred season on April 28. The virtual tote board and accompanying video forums have not begun to be installed and a decision has to be made whether or not to seed the infield or lay sod. There are big lakes inside the infield. The tune itself has been designed, so the lakes are fed by using the runoff. The song is getting rave critiques from the horsemen, but the barns, now not so much. Two of the most interested parties on the event Monday had been Norm Castiglione and Robert Vargo of Okotoks’s Riversedge Racing Stables, who have the largest quantity of horses as a way to be racing right here this yr, at 50. The mile music is perfect, they both say.

In many ways, it makes Edmonton a huge-league tune. And it’ll rank proper up there, surface-sensible, with the very first-rate of them. The Century Casinos humans delivered in a California company to layout and supply the track that required 1, a hundred truck loads of clay base, a membrane stage, 1, a hundred truckloads of beaten drain rock, some other membrane, 1, a hundred truckloads of limestone that the harness horses race on and any other 1, one hundred truckloads of a sand and mulch mixture for the thoroughbred cushion on top. All this changed into the haze of woodland fires inside the fall and the coldest Edmonton wintry weather in 40 years.

“It’ll place a whole new face on the future of horse racing right here,” stated Castiglione. Like anybody else involved, Castiglione is involved to see how it’ll all play out. “Hopefully, it’ll result in the horse populace growing. With the charges of training horses and the handbag structure right now, there are no longer quite a few upsides beyond being a heck of a interest. But there’s simplest so much you may lose.” Castiglione said he’s dissatisfied the horsemen, a miserable bunch at Northlands in various regions in current years, weren’t consulted to any real diploma. “That turned into the massive mistake they made,” stated Vargo. And there were others.

“This is going to be a tough year at the backstretch,” said Castiglione. The trouble is the barns designed in the sort of manner, requiring his humans to be “spending all their time hauling manure approximately four hundred ft.” There are barns with a complete of 800 stalls, but the simplest one is presently open. Some of the stalls in the different barn are expected to be open subsequent Monday and the relaxation of them per week earlier than the first race day. Castiglione stated in case you wish to extend the pony populace, you want greater stall space. And the format is critically incorrect.

“The horses are the celebs. The horses are the product,” brought Castiglione, the horsemen’s Benevolent Protective Association. president “We’re disappointed we weren’t dealt with like companions and experience we could have helped prevent numerous errors.” That said, he is going to return to the mile song. All the running shoes agree that the tune itself is outstanding,” said Castiglione. “That’s the No. 1 thing.” He said the mile song virtually needs to make it plenty easier to price horses here and hold them more healthy without all of the tight turns. And if the purses pass up and the phrase from the backstretch is fantastic throughout the industry, other stables may start to ship horses right here. It very well could be the dawning of a brand new day.