Meadowlands Saturday night

[GOAT]

Did you see the drivers colony for Saturday night at The Meadowlands. Just bumbs.

[JT]

Friday night is awful.. Piss poor drivers. Amateur races and the biggest purse is 15 grand. What a joke, but remember it's the mecca of harness racing. LOL No wonder their handle sucks. Might as well throw darts and pick those numbers

[CHeCK EyE]

Which track is consistently higher? My guess is Mohawk? Has Hoosier?

[JT]

Which track is consistently higher? My guess is Mohawk? Has Hoosier?

Mohawk and all Ohio tracks not named Northfield. Look at Dayton's card and purses today and compare it to The Meadowlands.

[Bitter Truth]

JT, I hate M[1] too but I don't know where you are looking but M[1] 's handle is like
at least 4 times higher.[probably more] Purses better sure 'but' NOT handle. Just sayin

[JT]

JT, I hate M[1] too but I don't know where you are looking but M[1] 's handle is like
at least 4 times higher.[probably more] Purses better sure 'but' NOT handle. Just sayin

My bad I thought he/she meant purses not handle. I know Meadowlands has a much higher handle but for the life of me I don't know why? Maybe living off the glory years of the past. The racing product their sucks compared to years past and it'll get worse with Freehold closing.

[CHeCK EyE]

It is interesting the purses elsewhere are better yet the handle does not follow suit.

In college I followed racing quite a bit and have only just this month come back around to it, probably 10-15 year gap. The full fields of 10 definitely help the handle at M1, and while the drivervcolony at the moment leaves to be desired it does leave some unpredictability and possibly better prices. I've only watched the last few weeks cards and the racing seems competitive and exciting, not a lot of wire to wire winners or favorites it seems.

Mohawk ive watched a few cards too, maybe I just gravitate toward bigger ovals...

[AgentQ]

When your premiere track encourages amateur driving for 30% of the card, you know the people running the place are not serious about their product. I love Mark Silva and the others but c'mon man I work hard for my money. Their handle is propped up by a CAW that basically is subsidized by Gural as to appear as a legit handle. They play to break even and win on the generous rebate and they are allowed to jam in thousands of bets at the last second, based on complex algortithims that are derived and based on loads of available data. Hardly a level playing field but Gural doesn't care, he's in it for himself. 

[Papillon]

My bad I thought he/she meant purses not handle. I know Meadowlands has a much higher handle but for the life of me I don't know why? Maybe living off the glory years of the past. The racing product their sucks compared to years past and it'll get worse with Freehold closing.

When gaming subsidizes purses, the handle means very little-so there is no correlation

one reason M1 handle well is. name recognition--people get all warm and fuzzy about M1 racing in the 80s and 90s
we were all younger and had more enthusiasm-memories of yesteryear

another reason is people feel like they have a "fair shot" with two turn racing-they feel as if they don't have much shot on half mile ovals were frequently its a chalkie lineup that go a merry-go-round trip many times

as far as thinking they have a "fair shot"--many don't realize half or more of Gurals handle is CAW that they are betting into--posters like SAW have their head buried in the sand about monster rebates, pool analyses that CAWs are doing and they betting after the race starts--is not uncommon as M1 still handle over $1mil(even with amateur driving races) that is not CAW money

most of us here are grey haired aging men who actually witnessed harness racing in its heydey-with tracks like Roosevelt-Brandywine-Liberty Bell-Balmoral,-Maywood-Pompano-Hollywood-etc when there was rarely any juicing and guys like Stanley Dancer and Bill Haughton, etc had their own businesses owning, training and driving their own stock

unfortunately those days are long gone--but the warm and fuzzy feeling of legitimate racing from yesteryear still exists in a small percentage of fans/bettors--and those non rebated, non CAW dollars are exactly what the CAWs feed upon-otherwise it would be just cannibalism amongst the highly rebated players

[Scooteroo]

I'm one of those grey-haired aging men who used to live 1 mile from Brandywine Raceway and went there every night. I also ventured up to Liberty Bell many times even though I was under 21 at the time which was the law in PA back then for admission. We used to jump the fence at the top of the stretch to get in. Believe it or not, Brandywine's 1st post was 8:28.

[Papillon]

I'm one of those grey-haired aging men who used to live 1 mile from Brandywine Raceway and went there every night. I also ventured up to Liberty Bell many times even though I was under 21 at the time which was the law in PA back then for admission. We used to jump the fence at the top of the stretch to get in. Believe it or not, Brandywine's 1st post was 8:28.

I was a regular at both Brandywine and Liberty Bell as a teen--and rarely missed a Sunday night. The racing was great, competitive and the crowds were enthusiastic

casinos in Atlantic City and then simulcasting turned racing upside down here in the DelVal

I have fond memories of the Keystone-Liberty Bell double headers--the tracks were about 3 miles apart

Jack Lamar called the races at Keystone and Steve Ross then Joe Eichorn would call Liberty Bell

Roy Schudt then Flyers hockey Hall of Fame announcer Gene Hart called the races at Brandywine

[Brown jug]

Saturday night racing at big m was very good
lots of action and good payouts

[Scooteroo]

I was a regular at both Brandywine and Liberty Bell as a teen--and rarely missed a Sunday night. The racing was great, competitive and the crowds were enthusiastic

casinos in Atlantic City and then simulcasting turned racing upside down here in the DelVal

I have fond memories of the Keystone-Liberty Bell double headers--the tracks were about 3 miles apart

Jack Lamar called the races at Keystone and Steve Ross then Joe Eichorn would call Liberty Bell

Roy Schudt then Flyers hockey Hall of Fame announcer Gene Hart called the races at Brandywine

[Scooteroo]

I was at Keystone Race Track on opening day. Dover Downs had a cheap thoroughbred meet for a few years in the early 70's, Jack Lamaar was their announcer. As for Roy Shudt, in his final year before retiring, he announced a meet at Harrington and was awful. The track wasn't well lit, and he was around 80 years old then, I felt sorry for him.

[Grandstand Handicapper]

The Meadowlands right now has a very poor product. Plain and simple. For me the prerequisites are-----large and competitive fields, a large pool to be into, and reasonable takeout(s) that can deter rebate shops (and all you have to do to get rid of them is lower the takeout-----but tracks are hesitate to do that because they don't want to finance the short-term "loss" on their end until handle increases. Of course they will say there are no assurances handle will increase. Life I've long said, people who run racetracks' don't know anything about racetracks' operate, LOL.)

Poor product, and every other gripe, complaint, injustice, etc.-----the reason people still play the Meadowlands is simply history, familiarity, name recognition, and it's real. It's the devil you know vs. the devil you don't know. It's real because even though today's product and racing is absolutely nothing like what it used to be-----one, it's the mile track and people are comfortable that is an equalizer. Two, most people have been there. Many times. Nothing like it was, but to them it's real, they've seen it, been there, etc. Three most people aren't smart enough to flip the switch and make another track (Woodbine/Mohawk is the only real equivalent) their go-to, home track. Very few people have been there, and even fewer have been there regularly. Big difference between the average horse player and a pro.

In the end, it will get worse before it gets better. Bottom line, you go to any place, any where, to gamble, be entertained, whatever the reason is. You don't like it. You go home.