Though much of its business stems from video gaming machines these days, Yonkers Raceway returned to its roots when it hosted the second consecutive Yonkers Trot at the raceway after it was held elsewhere in 2004 and 2005.
The race was held in Chicago and Freehold, N.J., respectively, those years while the track was closed during construction of Empire City at Yonkers Raceway. Empire City contains about 5,500 video gaming machines, which draws a large percentage of the total visitors to the raceway.
The Yonkers Trot, first run in 1955, is the prestigious third leg of the “Triple Crown of Harness Racing.”
The race was better attended this year than its return last year, said Yonkers Raceway Publicity Director Frank Drucker, and one reason may be due to improvements made at the track in the intervening year.
“Last year the race came back right after construction (of Empire City),” he said. “It was a lot more user friendly this year. Also, last year the race was run in late November.”
Among the “user friendly” improvements was the construction of an additional area to view the races, he said.
Drucker said the importance of hosting the race is not just for the prestige, but to keep the “sustaining payments” on the horses that ran the race.
In harness racing, a horse owner pays each track annual payments to be able to run races there, and if a track does not operate a race it has to give that money back.
Drucker said the two tracks that hosted the Yonkers Trot in 2004 and 2005 expressed interest in continuing to host the race, but that was not a consideration for Yonkers Raceway.
“That was never our consideration,” he said. “The race will be run here for the foreseeable future.”
The Yonkers Trot was one of 10 races on the card that night, and about $800,000 total was wagered on the entire card.
“It generated some more interest than a normal Saturday race,” said Drucker of the Yonkers Trot.
He said the crossover of people who come to the raceway for the racing and those who are there for the video gaming is marginal.
“It would be naïve to think you”™d convert gaming people to racing people, and vice versa,” he said.
Video gaming continues to be a big draw at the raceway. For the week ending Aug. 25, Empire City had a net video income of $8.3 million, almost $5 million of which was given as aid to public education in the state, according to figures provided by the New York Lottery.
The New York state Constitution requires that a portion of Lottery revenue be distributed to support public education
And as for the race itself? Green Day won the Yonkers Trot in wire-to-wire fashion.
Green Day, owned by Jim and Mary Raymer of the Pennsylvania-based Trillium Racing Stable, won the mile-long race in record time, 1:56.
“The draw worked out very well and the driver (Catello Manzi) knew exactly what to do,” said Jim Raymer.
Manzi, a harness racing Hall of Famer, won his third Yonkers Trot, previously winning in 1994 and 2003.
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