Racing needs to identify the mixture of selling points to reinvent itself in the public mind

The king is dead. Long live the king.

Exactly who the new king will be is a good question. One will emerge eventually to take the place of Point Given. The new king's reign may not last as long as Point Given (yikes!). He may not be as good as Point Given (who is?). He may not have any impact on attracting new fans to the sport (did Point Given?).

A problem with superstars is that they are unreliable. You cannot count on them to come along when you need them, to stay around for long, or to draw new fans to racing.

Quantifying the effect of a big horse on attendance and handle is difficult. A record crowd of 60,486 watched Point Given win the Travers Stakes (G1), but Saratoga was in the midst of a record meeting. The track surpassed 1-million in attendance for the first time in its history. By comparison, the 2000 Travers was attended by a then-record Travers day crowd of 54,116, as Unshaded defeated Albert the Great and Commendable.

Rather than depend on one horse, racing must find the right promotion, the right hook, to attract more people to racing.

NASCAR makes its drivers the stars, and auto racing in the last decade has gone through a boom that makes Thoroughbred racing enthusiasts envious. What is the attraction of seeing cars going around in circles while sitting amid a deafening noise when you cannot even bet on the outcome? Apparently, it is a lot of fun, say the attendance numbers.

The challenge of every sport is to either invent itself or reinvent itself over time.

Hockey capitalized on the trade of Canadian star Wayne Gretzky to warm-weather Los Angeles; in turn, a number of Sunbelt cities embraced the sport. Where hockey was once the sole domain of snowbound cities, today National Hockey League teams are in Dallas, Miami, Phoenix, Atlanta, San Jose, Raleigh, Tampa Bay, Anaheim, and Nashville.

In the 1970s, the National Basketball Association was viewed as a league infested with players with drug problems and an unwholesome image. But by the time David Stern and his marketing team were finished, it was the hottest sport in the country.

Baseball, the American pastime, took a nosedive in popularity when a strike eliminated the 1994 World Series, but fans have short memories, and baseball today has regained much of its lost popularity.

There is no reason horse racing, with one of the longest and richest sporting traditions in this country, cannot enjoy a revival as well.

But horse racing has not done much to reinvent itself and has not marketed itself well.

Whether it is by promoting jockeys, the ambiance of the track, the beauty of the horse, a day in the sun, the pageantry of the sport, or the intellectual challenge of handicapping, there is something for almost everyone in racing. The National Thoroughbred Racing Association must present a focused marketing campaign to get fans into the stands.

First effects of MRLS

Early returns on the effects of mare reproductive loss syndrome (MRLS) can be found in the Report of Live Foals by Stallion for 2001. According to the recently released report, Kentucky, the state most affected by MRLS, will have fewer foals than in 2000. In last year's live foal report, Kentucky produced 13,786 foals from 20,017 mares bred as of August 31, or 68.9% live foal from mares bred. In the 2001 report, Kentucky produced 13,693 foals from 20,998 mares, a 65.2% rate. It is the first decrease in the foal count in Kentucky in eight years.

Kentucky has historically produced a higher live foal rate from mares bred. From 2000 to 1996, the percentages have been approximately 69%, 69%, 68%, 67%, and 73%. A success rate of 69% for 2001 would have yielded 14,489 foals, or 796 more foals than the 13,693 foals reported.

Reports on MRLS this spring indicated that about 500 foals in Kentucky had been lost due to the problem, and that appears to be the case. If estimates of 15% to 20% of the mares in Kentucky this year failed to get in foal for 2002 due to MRLS, the loss to the breeding industry next year will be much greater, numbering into the thousands.

The tremendous economic losses from MRLS are now coming into better focus.