Flatter: Oklahoma walkover fits all too well in summer of 2025

Tens of millions of people spent early Thursday evening getting ready for the Philadelphia Eagles’ coronation against the Dallas Cowboys to christen the new NFL season. Fewer of us were transfixed at the same time by what was going on in Oklahoma City.

“And Hard Gold is off.”

That was what track announcer Dale Day told us few, proud, faithful viewers a half-minute past the scheduled post time at 6:56 p.m. CDT. Never mind what Maria Taylor and that cast of thousands were telling us on NBC. There was a cast of one performing a horse show in the third race at Remington Park.

Remington Park has 1st walkover in track history.

“The first and possibly biggest hurdle of the walkover has been cleared, getting out of the gate and on into a run, a stride without any issues. And that’s exactly what’s going on with Morales and Hard Gold.”

Day was about to prove he could fill time while a 5-year-old gelding piloted by replacement jockey Adrian Morales jogged a mile around the main track with virtually no suspense about the outcome. Call it a winner-take-all prize of $7,500 while Hard Gold was in for a $5,000 claiming tag. The race that had four scratches beforehand also was a priceless embarrassment for a sport which has had its fill of them lately.

“As they move into the first turn, over just about two paths off the rail in a decent stride right now. Not full out running. Be shocked to see anything fast going on here. The term glorified workout is often thrown about in a race where a horse wins easily, but in this case, it is exactly what’s going on. This is a glorified workout for Hard Gold, all alone out there, not unlike getting exercise in the morning.”

Day probably had time to explain to viewers that this tap dance was brought on by a dispute. One side was made up of riders asking the Jockeys’ Guild to speak for them. The other side was made up of management from the Thoroughbred Racing Association of Oklahoma. Stuck on a $75-per-race loser’s fee for 15 years, the Guild asked for $110. The TRAO offered $90. When force and object made themselves irresistible and immovable, management found five fill-in riders such as Morales, who worked the Gillespie County Fair in Texas, to cross what may as well have been a picket line Thursday.

“Five furlongs left in this walkover for Morales and Hard Gold. Hard Gold, a career winner of four career races to this point, has earned over $116,000 overall. Now with a half-mile to go in this walkover, Hard Gold continues the elongated orbit around the beautiful, infield pond at the turf course here at Remington Park.”

In spite of Day’s gauzy treatment, the whole scene was quite ugly, even after the two sides came to terms late Thursday morning. In a move that a child of 6 could have suggested, the $90-$110 chasm was bridged with a $100-per-race settlement. Too bad there was no child of 6 around when they really needed one. Alas, it was too late to get the regular riders back after their walkout from the evening’s nine races, which were scratched down to all of 33 horses.

“Into the second and last turn, Morales and Hard Gold, three furlongs to go. Many people scrambling for the record books and history books when this walkover became a reality today.”

Day learned the walkover was unprecedented at Remington. So, then, was the stubborn abandonment of common sense that led to this moment. Not that both sides were without their cases. Labor would point out that running a business comes with a duty to pay employees a living wage. Management would note the average handle per 2025 race at Remington before Thursday was $74,436, down 33% from last year and 55% from the COVID boom of 2020. Both sides could make a poverty case. But seriously, couldn’t they have found their solution without brinkmanship?

“Spectacular Bid’s famous walkover in the 1980 Woodward Stakes at Belmont Park on Sept. 20, almost exactly 45 years ago, had people talking a bit this afternoon. Hard Gold, not Spectacular Bid, just the last one standing in this third event of the night.”

Day knew no one would confuse the circumstances of these races going on two generations apart. Spectacular Bid was a champion who scared off would-be rivals, the last of whom was scratched for an injury. Pigheadedness was the culprit at Remington Park, where the public still was invited to show up and throw down cash on an inferior product other than the chicken tenders and beer. At least there was no betting on the third race.

“And now in the stretch, Hard Gold galloping leisurely home the final eighth under Morales, who will pick up his second victory of the night. Here is Hard Gold, completing the first walkover in Remington Park history.”

With the princely sum of $178,166 in all-sources wagering for Thursday’s nine races, it appeared even the sons of batchers who clog the tills with computer wagers stayed away. Even they had to question the veracity of what was going on.

Speaking of that and the sudden understudies riding in unfamiliar territory, one wonders why the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority did not lean on the TRAO to cancel Thursday’s card for, you know, integrity and safety.

“Happy to see that the jockeys got a deal done,” a HISA spokesperson said Thursday even though it was too late to keep substitutes from piloting a skeleton program. CEO Lisa Lazarus still could have made one call and stopped the insanity. The same goes for Friday night, because the regular riders will not be back until Saturday.

Thursday’s ignominy of Remington Park was a graceless punctuation mark on a summer which has included minuscule fields for Grade 1 races at Del Mar and Saratoga, the storied tradition of timing foul-ups at Kentucky Downs and the stupefying shrinkage of a 1 1/8-mile race into 1 1/16 miles at Saratoga. That also is where 14 horses who were injured while racing or training died since June. Fourteen also was the number in 2023 when HISA launched an investigation which resulted in a 214-page report.

The HISA spokesperson who responded about the Oklahoma matter also was asked last week and then Thursday if the Spa would be investigated again.

“Hope to have a final decision on Saratoga soon,” was the latest response.

And so we hurry up and wait. And watch. And wager. And wonder why the times and distances of races are so confounding in this day and age. And why it took so damn long in Oklahoma to realize that the compromise between a $90 offer and a $110 demand was $100.

“At the finish, Hard Gold. Congratulations.”

Yeah. Congratulations. Now back to the spitting image of football.

Ron Flatter’s column appears Friday mornings at Horse Racing Nation. Comments below and at RonFlatterRacingPod@gmail.com are welcomed, encouraged and may be used in the feedback segment of the Ron Flatter Racing Pod, which also is posted every Friday.