Future stars & future wagers: Churchill kicks off fall meet Sunday

Horse racing on the prosperous Kentucky circuit shifts from Keeneland in Lexington to Churchill Downs in Louisville on Sunday as the historic home of the Kentucky Derby readies to open its 130th Fall Meet with an 11-race program – all for promising 2-year-old Thoroughbreds – at 1 p.m. (all times Eastern).

The popular 26-day stand covers a five-week stretch every Wednesday-Sunday through Dec. 1 – the latest Fall Meet closing date since the seven-date Nov. 24-Dec. 1 meeting in 1928.

It kicks off in style Sunday with the 15th annual “Stars of Tomorrow I” program, which is entirely devoted to hopeful 2-year-old stars that have aspirations of trail-blazing their way to next year’s Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve (GI) and Longines Kentucky Oaks (GI).

     

Sunday’s 11-race opening day card is headlined by the seventh runnings of two one-mile, $120,000-added overnight stakes – the open-company Street Sense and Rags to Riches for fillies. Those races serve as local steppingstones to the two Grade II, $300,000, 1 1/16-mile counterparts on the Saturday, Nov. 30 “Stars of Tomorrow II” program – the open Kentucky Jockey Club and Golden Rod for fillies that are part of the Road to the Kentucky Derby and Kentucky Oaks series which award points to the Top 4 finishers (10-4-2-1).

   

Inaugurated in 2005, Churchill Downs’ “Stars of Tomorrow” programs have helped launched the careers of numerous graded stakes winners, including more than 50 future Grade I winners led by Horse of the Year champions Gun Runner (2017) and Rachel Alexandra (2009), Kentucky Derby winner Super Saver (2010), Kentucky Oaks winners Rachel Alexandra (2009), Believe You Can (2012) and Monomoy Girl (2018), Preakness winners Shackleford (2011) and War of Will (2019), Belmont winner Creator (2016) as well as 2012 Breeders’ Cup Classic and 2013 Stephen Foster Handicap hero Fort Larned and 2013 champion 3-year-old Will Take Charge.

     

Over the course of the meet, horsemen will have ample opportunities to uncork promising juveniles or seek year-end graded-stakes glory. All told, 13 stakes races cumulatively worth $3.005 million – which includes nine graded stakes events – will be run during the fall stand. Meanwhile, bettors are certain to be challenged by the competitive Fall Meet racing that typically pits the fastest and battle-tested horses against the recently freshened year-end bloomers.

With a compact 26-day schedule and not as many competing race meets at year’s end, the Fall Meet often offers larger fields. Last fall, the average field size was 8.9 horses per race but this year’s Spring and September meets featured average fields of 8.5 horses and a strong 9.3 horses, respectively.

 

The reason? Purses at Churchill Downs have skyrocketed, thanks to robust business from state-of-the-art historical racing machines that debuted last year at nearby Derby City Gaming. This year’s Fall Meet will feature a record $20,197,000 in prize money offered (all purses include prize money from the Kentucky Thoroughbred Development Fund), which averages to a hefty $776,808 per day. There will be a total of 272 races and the average purse offered is $74,254 per race. Maiden special weight races are worth $95,000 and allowance races range from $97,000 to $105,000.

The anchor of the lucrative stakes program comes on “Black Friday,” Nov. 29 with the 145th running of the $600,000 Clark Presented by Norton Healthcare (GI). The 1 1/8-mile test for 3-year-olds and up annually lures some of the top older horses in North America and is one of six stakes events cumulatively worth $1.97 million to be contested over Thanksgiving weekend. Also contested on this day is the $300,000 Mrs. Revere (GII), a prominent 1 1/16-mile turf race for 3-year-old fillies.

The betting menu will be the same as recent meets and includes the 20-cent minimum “Single 6 Jackpot,” which is offered on the last six races each day with a low 15-percent takeout. The Single 6 Jackpot will be paid out only if there is a single winning wager with six winners placed at the required minimum bet value. If there are multiple winning wagers with six winners in the six-race sequence, 90 percent of the net money wagering into the pool will be paid out, and the remaining 10 percent will carry to the Single 6 Jackpot. If there are no tickets will all six winners, 100 percent of the pool will carry to the Single 6 Jackpot. There will be a mandatory payout on closing day.

The first pools of the 2020 Kentucky Derby Future Wager will be offered Nov. 28-Dec. 1. The traditional pool with 23 individual wagering interests and an “all others” option will return, and so will the Kentucky Derby Sire Future Wager, which debuted in 2015 and requires bettors to wager on the winning sire for next year’s Kentucky Derby winner. The other Future Wager dates will be Feb. 7-9 (Pool 2), March 6-8 (Pool 3) and April 3-5 (Pool 4). The lone Kentucky Oaks Future Wager will coincide with Pool 3 of the Kentucky Derby Future Wager on March 6-8.