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Hawthorne slashes Illinois Derby purse

Posted: Tuesday, January 25, 2011 7:11 PM

HAWTHORNE RACE COURSE

FourFootedFotos.com

by Neil Milbert

Hawthorne Race Course received permission to reduce the purse of the April 9 Illinois Derby (G3) from $500,000 to $250,000 during Tuesday’s meeting of the Illinois Racing Board.

The board also approved Hawthorne’s request to move another graded stakes race, the $200,000 Sixty Sails Handicap (G3) for fillies and mares, from April 16 to an unspecified date during its fall meeting and vacated four Sundays—March 27 and April 3, 10, and 17—from the racing schedule during the track’s February 11 through April 30 meeting.

Hawthorne’s assistant general manager, Jim Miller, told the racing board the Illinois Derby purse reduction and the curtailment of the schedule were made in order to “maintain overnight purses.”

“This [purse cut] will enable us to have three full days of overnights,” Miller said. “We considered canceling the race. Hopefully, it’s a one-year hit.”

Illinois Thoroughbred Horseman’s Association president Mike Campbell said his board of directors concurred.

“Given the state of the industry, I don’t think we have a choice at this time,” Campbell testified. “This is a compromise. We’ve gotten to the point where we have to put our house in order. If we don’t, I’m fearful for Hawthorne.”

The cuts came in the wake of the Illinois House of Representatives’ failure earlier this month to vote on a bill allowing slot machines at racetracks after it had passed the Senate during the veto session. The tracks and horsemen intend to make another attempt to win passage of slots legislation during the General Assembly’s spring session.

Arlington Park also had to slash its stakes schedule because of the absence of the new revenue source for purses that the slot machines would have provided.

The stakes schedule the Racing Board approved for that track was $450,000 less than originally planned. Two races for three-year-old fillies were removed from the schedule—the Arlington Oaks (G3), a $150,000 guaranteed race in 2010, and the ungraded American One Thousand Guineas, which was a $200,000 turf race last year.

Neil Milbert is an Illinois-based Thoroughbred Times correspondent