Charlestown Race Track

Maryland's one day of racing

This old oval off Northern Parkway has long been regarded as the red-headed stepchild among the hosts of marquee racing events. It's a rundown facility where officials consider themselves lucky to find 3,000 attendees rattling around in the worn out grandstand on an average day, where patrons lock their car doors to pass through dilapidated neighborhoods around the track as evening falls.

For one week, however, freshly planted flowers and bold sponsorship logos on corporate tents will juxtapose sharply against the peeling paint, leaky ceilings and rusted metal. Crowds, often 100,000 or more, will come pouring through the turnstiles. The nation's best 3-year-olds will run here. One, Kentucky Derby winner Animal Kingdom, could take this race to get a shot at the legendary Triple Crown.

That three-race series hasn't been swept since 1978 when it was won by Affirmed, but every time they run the Preakness, there is hope that this could be the year. On Preakness Day, the track packs in enough race-goers and infield revelers in one fell swoop to skew the average attendance and bump up the betting handle for the entire year. In a seasonal burst of glory, the Maryland Jockey Club pulls out all the stops, presenting a weekend of pomp and circumstance.

"Obviously the Preakness is the premier event not only in the state but across the Mid-Atlantic region, and I'd say it's one of the top five or six races in the country," said Tom Chuckas, the Maryland Jockey Club's president and COO. "All of Maryland horse racing takes its cue from the Preakness. It pretty much sets the tone for the year both from a racing perspective and a financial perspective. As the Preakness goes, so goes the year."

It's not all smoke and mirrors, this one weekend of big-league racing, because members of the Maryland Jockey Club (which runs Pimlico and Laurel Park) have readily admitted to their problems. There is no attempt to pretend that racing here is anywhere near this level any other time of the year, no pretense that the state's horsemen and racetracks are doing anything but hanging on by a thread.

Were it not for this one legendary event, that thread would have been severed long ago.

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It is nothing new to write about the demise of Maryland racing.

Charles Town Race's premier event will be graded for the first ...

Santa Anita Handicap (G1) winner Game On Dude and millionaires Gone Astray and Awesome Gem headline perhaps the most talented field of handicap horses assembled this year for the third running of the Grade 3, $1 million Charles Town Classic on Saturday night at Hollywood Casino at Charles Town Races.

Graded this year for the first time, the Charles Town Classic has attracted a field of 10 outstanding runners, every one of them a graded stakes winner. The last non-Breeders’ Cup race in the United States that had 10 or more starters that were all graded stakes winners going into the gate was the 2006 Arlington Million.

“In two calendar years, the Charles Town Classic went from never having been run to a graded stakes race where the entire gate is filled with graded stakes winners,” said Erich Zimny, Charles Town’s Director of Racing Operations. “Making it a prominent race in the handicap division so quickly is a remarkable accomplishment by our entire staff.”

Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert admits he is entering uncharted waters by running his rising star Game On Dude in the Charles Town Classic.

From the wide-open expanses of Santa Anita Park to the tight turns of Charles Town’s six-furlong course, Baffert is unsure how Game On Dude will respond to having to negotiate a three-turn race. For a $1 million jackpot prize, however, he is more than interested to find out.

“I sent my horse up there, and I told my jockey (David Flores) to put two marbles in his mouth, and to spit a marble out every time he crosses the finish line to remind himself there’s another lap to go around,” Baffert said.

Baffert has enlisted veteran David Flores, one of the top riders at the Fairplex Park meet in Southern California, to ride Game On Dude.

“He’s a tremendous bullring rider,” Baffert said. “He worked him for me here and got to know him a little bit.”

Game On Dude, who also won the Lone Star Derby (G3) as a 3-year-old, galloped over the Charles Town track on Wednesday in preparation for the race.

He will have his hands full with the competition.

Phipps Stable’s Gone Astray returns for a second try in the Charles Town Classic. He finished seventh last year after clipping heals on the first turn. Two races later, he defeated Duke of Mischief, another Classic entrant, by five lengths to win the Salvatore Mile (G3) at Monmouth, and by year’s end, had gone past the million-dollar mark in lifetime earnings.

Charles Town

As the two race tracks competed for spectators, the Downs had a distinct advantage because it offered night racing; the Charles Town Race Track also ...

Jockey's Guild - History of Race Riding

1954 - 22.750 Tyro Slakes on Kinda Smart; Laurel Race Track. 1956- 15000 Chesapeake Stakes on Frosty Mr.; Charles Town Race Track - 25.000 Botany 500 on ...

Goldenseal

... Interior of John League's photography studio in Charles Town. i. mi Horses round the first curve at the new Charles Town Race Track, built in 1933. ...

TC memorandum decisions

... Total Expenses -2308885.46 $ 499334.72 Less: Unknown Difference 1501.70 Additional Income from Charles Town Race Track $ 497833.02 A similar explanation ...

The West Virginia encyclopedia

Michael Ridderbusch WVU Libraries Charles Town Races The Charles Town Race Track opened on December 2, 1933, shortly after West Virginia legalized racing ...