The only significant barrier one faces when making the trip to magical Saratoga Racecourse in upstate New York is the prohibitive cost of decent lodging near the track. I’ve tried every which way around this hurdle. I’ve stayed in fleabag motels. I’ve crashed in Albany. I’ve split rooms with pals. I’ve gone late in the meet when rates drop a notch below peak. There were even a few times I paid through the nose and hoped a few winning bet slips would mitigate the damage.
This year, I found a new way to beat the $300 per night room rate. I did the one-day round-trip. The mode of transport: a bus.
It was a long day. It’s a serious buzz kill to walk out of the track and get on a bus for a long ride down the Thruway in the dark. But it wasn’t as bad as I imagined it might be. I was able to see all but the first two races on Wednesday’s card and got pretty comfortable on the bus.
I took Megabus, a popular low-fare motor coach service that serves two-dozen cities in the Northeast from New York City. My round-trip fare was just $8.50. If you book early, you can land a $1 one-way fare. Seats that sell early are the cheapest. They slide up the scale as you approach the departure date. The service was non-stop between New York and Saratoga and continued on to Burlington, Vermont. A majority of those on the bus were traveling to Burlington. It didn’t appear anybody on the bus was going to the races despite the schedule’s perfect timing coordination with the start and end of the Saratoga card.
I left my apartment in Queens at 7 AM Wednesday. I took the F to 34th Street and grabbed a large coffee and an egg sandwich at a deli on 35th. I then walked west five long avenue blocks to 34th just east of the river. Megabus picks up at a stop across from the Javits Convention Center. My bus was scheduled to leave at 8:30 AM but didn’t push off until about 9:15 AM. There was lots of confusion about which lines were associated with which bus and the customer service agents working for Megabus seemed overwhelmed. As we boarded the bus to Saratoga/Burlington, there were several arguments about the baggage allowance. Customers are allowed one piece of checked luggage with a max weight of 50 pounds. Several customers packed what appeared to be their entire existence. Some were denied boarding and the driver of my bus (Richard) was forced to intervene and invoke his final authority to leave customers behind. Once we left, Rich took an unusual route out of the city. He drove east on 34th all the way to Madison and then north all the way up to 138th Street where he caught the Deegan. We hit a construction-related traffic snarl about 45 miles south of Albany and lost probably 45 minutes sitting in stop-and-go before it opened up.
The bus drops off at the Saratoga harness track/racino. From there, it’s a mile and a half walk along Nelson to the thoroughbred track. There’s no sidewalk for much of the trek. You wouldn’t want to do the walk if it was raining because the shoulder along Nelson would be a sloshy mess.
I arrived on track at about a quarter to two. I paid the $3 general admission charge and made it to the window just in time to lose a win bet on the three-year-old New York-bred filly Ibid.
The Travers is run Saturday so lots of people are visiting for the week. The on-track crowd was announced at 16,902.
My pick four play was looking OK when Colony Strike (pictured above) won the second leg at 14.3 to 1. But then the potential payoff on the play took a hit when Richard Dutrow’s Willy Beamin won the feature at even money.
Dutrow horses will drive you nuts if you assess them purely on the data available. Willy Beamin is exhibit A in the long, tawdry timeline of examples that force the gambler to raise serious suspicion about Dutrow’s training methods. Beamin’s sudden and dramatic increase in performance level can’t be explained simply by tender loving care. Snatched up by Dutrow in a 25K claiming race in late March, Beamin had made five pedestrian runs with final times that were mediocre at best. Two races and three months later, Dutrow had the Beemer flying with Beyer speed figures that jumped 35 points. This is a pattern Dutrow is famous for as he’s piled up repeated infractions for juicing his horses. He’s currently fighting a ten-year suspension from the sport and one can only hope his banishment comes sooner rather than later. Dutrow made further mockery of conventional equine health by entering Beamin in Saturday’s King’s Bishop stakes race, a contest that will be run just three days after the horse was in high-gear for Wednesday’s open-lengths win.
As Dutrow’s bloated due process efforts unfold in a way that belittle efforts to inject integrity into New York racing, the organizational oversight of the sport also faces an uncertain future.
Governor Cuomo’s bold dismantling of the state racing’s oversight body is in the early stages. The structure of his new bureaucracy invites trouble given the slew of new political appointees who will be asked to usher in the next phase of the sport’s reform and rebuilding efforts. Flush with new slots cash, horse racing in New York needs a narrow if not singular non-political force to patch up once-great infrastructure and reverse declining fan interest in the game and the art of the wager. The new revenue stream from the gaming machines sets the stage for momentum in that regard but then Cuomo elbowed his way in. It’s like going back to square one. It likely won’t go well.
Among those who will pick appointees to Cuomo’s racing board is Senate Majority leader Dean Skelos. The Nassau County republican (pictured above) was at the track Wednesday. Skelos is on record in support of expanded gaming at Belmont Park.
Saratoga appeared to be in fine shape with few significant changes since I was last up there two summers ago. There is a wide range of craft beer options. Among those I enjoyed was the Blueberry Blonde Ale made in Utica, NY by the Saranac Brewery. It doesn’t taste like blueberries. It just smells like it as you tip for a sip. It’s good.
I had the $9.50 chicken sandwich from Hattie’s. It was ok. Too much French-fried crunchies and not enough chicken.
After the races, I walked back to the harness track to make the 7:00 PM (scheduled) return bus. It arrived 45 minutes late. I had time for a cocktail at the harness track bar and watched the trotters warm up. They ran clockwise during practice runs. A broken-down player who would have fit in nice with the cast of Luck iced his ankle at a seat near me. He smiled a bit when he told me about finding a $20 bill earlier that day on the floor at the thoroughbred track. “It’s a total pot-luck, man,” he said.
Megabus promises free Wi-Fi on the bus. It wasn’t working. The return journey ended with a drop-off at 23rd and 7th at about 11:30 PM. I took the 1 to the 7 back home. All in all, a fun day at one of the more beautiful sporting facilities you’ll ever see. If you haven’t been, you gotta go. I’d even recommend the bus.