Despite all of the uncertainty of this blasted virus we were able to get through a season that started with spring training back in February and opened in May and have raced right thru to the end of September.
It wasn’t easy for anybody as first we only had enough money to race 25 days, then we got an interest-free loan that was going to take us thru August. The British Columbia Government then stepped up to the plate and gave us a grant of $1,500,000.00 that was brought us thru all of September.
The CTHS Yearling and Mixed Sale was a complete success earlier this month and one could see some light at the end of the tunnel. Several new owners appeared as well as some owners who have been absent for a few years. Encouraging to say the least.
Barring no further setbacks over the winter from this deadly virus the whole world is fighting I think we will get back to close to some kind of normalcy in 2022.
The casinos have reopened and so the income to us from the two casino’s after two months our revenue stream from Fraser Downs and Hastings is as good as 2019. The OTB’s are slowly reopening which will give us time over the winter to build up a pretty fair sum for 2022.
The racing associations are well aware that we need to increase our horse population over the winter and are working to get some more incentive programs to assist owners in purchasing some fresh horses.
It looks like from the cash flow the 2022 purses could well be the amounts we increased to back on August 16. Plus the BC Bred Bonus is now 35%.
Realizing the need for foreign-bred horses a very lucrative fresh horse program was released earlier this month and we are working on further incentives to assist owners purchasing out of province horses as we need to acquire a number of them as well.
Hopefully the CTHS is going to have a paddock sale of horses of racing age next March and we get a large number of horses consigned to it. We are going to need them for 2022 season.
Horses are in demand throughout North America as the recent sales have shown as prices have nearly doubled on lower level horses from 2019 to 2021. One would say there seems to be more money available for new horses than there are horses to purchase.
As this season comes to an end over the next two days there is a degree of optimism in the air for 2022.
(Read more from the Derby Bar & Grill here.)
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