HOT SPRINGS — David Longinotti said he’s normally asked two questions when he’s on the road recruiting horses to run at Oaklawn Park.
Longinotti, Oaklawn’s assistant general manager/racing, said trainers want to talk money, specifically the minimum purse, and the value of maiden special weights races.
Undoubtedly, they liked what they heard on those recruiting trips last summer and fall, particularly the maiden part.
“As good as it gets,” trainer Lynn Whiting said.
When Oaklawn’s 56-day live season begins Friday, maiden special weights races - the highest level for horses who have never won a race - will be worth $53,000, or $3,000 more than some stakes races Oaklawn carded for many years.
That $53,000 figure, fueled heavily by continued booming business involving electronic games, is among the highest in the country and a 32.5 percent increase over the start of the 2012 Oaklawn meeting, when those same races were worth $40,000.
Through a handful of purse increases and a participation bonus tied to field size, maiden special weights races at Oaklawn climbed as high as $55,000 during the final few days of the 2012 meeting.
But $53,000 is a record to open an Oaklawn meeting and further strengthens the track’s commitment to young horses, including its lucrative series of Kentucky Derby prep races.
“I think there was a lot of buzz about the $53,000,” Oaklawn General Manager Eric Jackson said. “It’s a big statement for racing in Arkansas, racing at Oaklawn.”
Longinotti and racing secretary Pat Pope said maidens running for $53,000 played a major role in luring several new high-profile trainers to Oaklawn this year, including Dale Romans, Al Stall, Eoin Harty, Helen Pitts and Phil Sims.
“I have no doubt the record that they read about, the trail to go the Triple Crown coming through here, had to help Dale Romans make the decision to come here,” Pope said. “But it had to be the maidens over $50,000 that did it, because last year they were $40,000.
“I guess the best way to say it is last year at $40,000, it didn’t get Dale Romans, it didn’t get Phil Sims, it didn’t get Al Stall. It sure made it easier to recruit.”
Pope said fans should see maiden special weights races stacked with lightly raced, well-bred horses who could develop into stakes-caliber runners.
Harty, for example, has Derby Eve, a 3-year-old filly who was born April 30, 2010, the day before that year’s Kentucky Derby.
Derby Eve, by Tiznow, is a full sister to multiple Grade I winner Colonel John.
Harty also trains Only in America, an unstarted 3-yearold son of Tiznow who is a full brother to 2009 Dubai World Cup winner Well Armed.
Pitts trains Islamorada, an unstarted 3-year-old Smart Strike filly out of Cat Cay, a Grade II stakes winner.
Trainer Grant Forster, an Oaklawn regular, said the influx of new trainers should make maiden special weights races deeper in quality this year.
He’s ready to chase some of those $53,000 pots, too.
“What a country,” he said.
Sports, Pages 15 on 01/08/2013