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Not by a Long Shot: A Season at a Hard Luck Horse Track

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Amid the glimmer and glitz, pomp and pageantry surrounding thoroughbred racing's famed Triple Crown it is very easy to forget that most of the folks who choose to make a living in the racing game toil in relative anonymity and many have a very difficult time just making ends meet. Author T.D. Thornton has been around racetracks for virtually all of his adult working life. "Not By A Long Shot: A Season At A Hard Luck Horse Track" is a story that Thornton felt really needed to be told. For only a tiny percentage of the horses, trainers and jockeys will ever see the big time. Yet without those who ply their trade at "mid-level" tracks like Suffolk Downs in Boston, Charles Town in West Virginia and Rockingham Park in New Hampshire, events like the Kentucky Derby and the Breeders Cup simply could not happen. "Not By A Long Shot" takes a look at the current state of thoroughbred racing in this country. Years in the making, "Not By A Long Shot" chronicles the 2000 spring meet at Boston's Suffolk Downs, a once proud facility now struggling to merely survive. Those who follow the sport will certainly understand what T.D. Thornton is writing about. For the rest of us, this book proves to be a real eye opener.

In the early chapters of "Not By A Long Shot" T.D. Thornton spends some time reviewing the history of thoroughbred racing in these United States. In the 1930's and 1940's thoroughbred racing was at the peak of its popularity. Enormous crowds filled the grandstands on a daily basis at major tracks across the country. Thoroughbreds like "Seabiscuit", "Whirlaway", "Citation" and "War Admiral" were household names. In this era, thoroughbred racing was not just the sport of kings but the sport of the common man as well. With the advent of television racetrack operators balked at the idea of putting their product on TV. They felt that frequent exposure on TV would adversely affect attendance and the handles at their facilities. It was a major tactical mistake. In the meantime, the major professional team sports teams gladly offered their games to the new medium and the popularity of these sports increased exponentially. And as Thornton explains the racing industry would never fully recover. Then in the 1960's and 1970's thoroughbred racing faced more stiff new competition from new state sponsored lotteries that would further diminish the sport. And now the racing industry is reeling from the vigorous competition spawned by the opening of dozens of new casinos all across the nation. Indeed, the future of live horse racing seems to be hanging in the balance.

At various points throughout "Not By A Long Shot" T.D. Thornton introduces us to a number of the colorful charactors who make up the fabric of his beloved Suffolk Downs. Readers will come to appreciate just how difficult it is for most of these folks to eke out a decent living in this business and how dangerous the sport can be as well. Thornton tells the tragic tale of top jockey Rudy Baez who was paralyzed in a serious accident during a race at Suffolk in August of 1999. In an instant his career was over and his life changed forever. Thornton also introduces his readers to many of the "Sufferin' Downs" regulars. A motley crew to say the least! At the same time Thornton gets us all up to speed with some spicy racetrack slang. Although it has been many years since I have been to the races T.D. Thornton has succeeded in whetting my appetite. I hope to visit Suffolk Downs before the current meet ends.

I found "Not By A Long Shot" to be a thoroughly entertaining read from cover to cover. T.D. Thornton is a superb writer who is extremely passionate about his subject. An excellent choice for sports fans and general readers alike. Highly recommended!

I've grown up around horses, without really appreciating horse racing, except as the occasional spectator at big event races (or once or twice, as the owner of a former race horse). I found myself completely captured by the book -- not so much because I like horses, but because it brought together for me all of the reasons I worry about horse racing and yet want racing to survive because it is so much a part of the horse "world." Horses are symbols both of freedom and tragedy, as so clearly demnonstrated with this tale.

T.D. Thornton is a masterful writer who does not follow a formula. In some ways, his strong and elegant writing reminds me of another favorite writer, Tracy Kidder, as he lets the story unfold rather than forcing a snappy ending. While Publishers Weekly criticized "Not by a Long Shot" as perhaps not having a strong enough narrative line -- that was exactly what drew me in, because the story never felt contrived or fomulaic. The tale of Suffolk Downs and its cast of characters, both four footed and two (and a few whose legs no longer work) are fascinating. I both wanted to hurry to the end -- and dreaded getting to the end, because that would mean I would have to exit the stage where anything can happen, including an unexpected win from an unlikely pair or a blood chilling accident from a pair that try too hard. I deliberately refused to allow myself to look at the sporting news to see whether Suffolk Downs itself still survives today -- and I won't give away that outcome here.

I found myself eager to spend a day at my own local race track after reading this book, just to compare notes. This book is in the great tradition of memoirs, giving the reader an insider's view of a special place.

Thank you, T.D. Thornton! I'll be looking for your byline elsewhere.

A fantastic read on one track in particuar and the entire racing industry as a whole. An important and very enjoyable read for anyone who loves the track. Thornton covers it all, from the politicians down to the wackiest track degenerates. Highly recommended for anyone who has been bitten by the racetrack bug at some point in their life.

At some point racing is going to be gone for good. This book tells us all the great things, available nowhere else, that we're going to lose.

This is the first review I have written for an Amazon book. It is a great read written with such honesty. Hope there are more books from this author down the line.

As a keen racing fan here in ireland, I am always looking to get a better handle on the US scene. This book gives a good insight into the reality of a struggling race-track tries to keep the show on the road. Very atmospheric, opinionated ( which is good )and I would really recommend it as a very good read for both the horse racing fan and general sports fan

This book is definitely worth your time if you are a horse-racing fan. This is especially true if you are aware of the life of day-to-day racing at a lower-level track like Suffolk Downs, because that is who the author writes about. The people and horses at a place like that are the backbone of racing, and there are plenty of interesting tales to tell. I wouldn't call it a great book, but it's solid, informative, and entertaining.

As someone originally from Boston, having spent many afternoons at Suffolk Downs, I'm a little bit biased. However, I found this book to be extremely interesting and very well written. While many books like this are written as advertisements, Mr. Thornton has no problem in exposing some of the less desirable sides of the industry. The overall balance between good and bad, happy and sad, is quite fair. There were passages that made me laugh out loud, others that were quite sad. There is an interesting section that exposes the chaos and corruptness that is Massachusetts state government. I would certainly recommend this book, especially to casual horse racing fans, industry insiders maybe not so much.

For someone who knows nothing about the racing industry this is an enlightening glimpse into the mechanics, personalities and stories that come together to create the excitement of the racing industry. The outsider may see this as the "sport of kings," with all the glamour we watch at the Kentucky Derby but this is a window into the toothless, hapless, shrewd, caring varied characters on the lower scale that keep the racing industry alive. Mr Thornton's style of writing is addictive, one gets caught up in his usage of words and his turns of phrase. A picture forms in one's mind and you can begin to watch the movie in your head.

T.D. Thornton's revealing book should do for horse racing what Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle" did for meat packing. But -- please -- hold the "reform" legislation. Government already has enough of its clumsy tentacles holding racing's head under water. "Not By A Long Shot" should be taken by racing industry participants as a call to the post of a higher consciousness characterized by self-examination, self-correction, and inspiration.

Media relations director of struggling Suffolk Downs in Year Y2K (enough went wrong at the East Boston track to make one suspect the move into the new century was somehow at fault), Thornton uses a deft hand and sharp mind in peeling the onion that it is thoroughbred racing. As with any onion's exploration, tears flow.

The author succeeds in giving a realistic picture brimming with tough love thanks to his training as a newspaper reporter mixed with an attraction to what Thornton calls the "cruel radiance" of the race course. Thornton's family connection (His father, Paul, is a Suffolk Downs trainer whose stable has included 2006 New England Horse of the Year Bodgiteer) gives his vision added range. Our author must be a pretty good diplomat as well since he manages to maintain part-time employment at "Sufferin' Downs" after publication of such a frank book.

With a sensibility in the tradition of Damon Runyon and Grantland Rice, Thornton manages to re-create the lovable roguishness racing enjoyed in its heyday. But, unlike many in today's establishment racing press, Thornton is no cheerleader lazily waiting around for the next press release or racing commission meeting. He charges at shabby thinking and practices like a horse coming down the home stretch. And that is the chief reason "Not By A Long Shot" should become a reference book for those who really love horse racing and want it to have a future.

To go along with his gritty look at racetrack life, Thornton scores a nice daily double by relating interesting bits from New England racing history. Among them --

--The story of Massachusetts thoroughbred owner Peter Fuller, Coretta Scott King, the tumult of 1968, and Dancer's Image (the Fuller-owned steed and only horse ever disqualified from winning the Kentucky Derby).

--The 1970s race-fixing scandal run by Boston native Fat Tony Ciulla that ensnared 39 tracks and dozens of jockeys including the great Angel Cordero Jr.

Thornton does an admirable job summing up the economic challenges facing horse racing. He quotes liberally from Bill Veeck's "Thirty Tons A Day" (a memoir of the maverick promoter's two years running Suffolk Downs) yet Thornton doesn't seem to consider that racing could solve many of its problems with the government by following Veeck's example. Veeck sued the Massachusetts state government to allow children to attend races -- and won. Shouldn't racing leaders stop playing games with elected officials and go to court to have the sport's economic rights upheld?

Also curiously missing from our astute author's observations is an examination of thoroughbred racing's inaccessible post times. Races at Suffolk Downs start at 12:45 p.m. and usually end at about 4:30 p.m. Three of its four cards per week are held on weekdays. Is it any wonder attendance has fallen when most races are conducted at times when most people are stuck at their jobs? Why not try night racing? It should be said that the mostly mid-level tracks that have gone to night cards haven't found the practice to be especially lucrative.

Thornton writes colorfully about Suffolk Downs "winter grind." Yet any person with a modicum of common sense would ask "Why the heck are they racing horses when it's 20 degrees outside? Doesn't track management realize that very few fans/bettors are going to show up? Isn't this just a waste of time and purse money?" The author lets it pass without criticism.

Another lapse of reason -- Chief Operating Officer Robert O'Malley speaks to Beacon Hill legislators after 19 other groups have testified and it's close to lunch time (p. 213). Didn't O'Malley realize his message was unlikely to be heard under such conditions?

These lapses begin to add up. This combined with a longtime industry inclination to seek monopoly privileges and subsidies (in recent years it's taken the form of pleas for "slot machines") conjures an image of a moribund industry cravenly trying to use government to stay on past its time. Thornton condemns this proclivity but that does nothing to erase the negative public image.

Besides byzantine systems brought about mostly because of government overregulation, horse racing today is suffering from its failure to embrace television 50 years ago (racing's fan base has grayed andthinned asa result). The Sport of Kings (or "king of sports" as Thornton cheekily calls it) is also suffering from a revolution that failed -- simulcasting. The growth of imported televised simulcasting has drained crowds and money away from live racing to the point where simulcasting now accounts for more than 80 percent of revenue at most tracks. Like "slot machines" today, simulcasting was touted as easy money by some track owners. In reality what it amounted to was a gamble involving an exchange of revenue streams. Not surprisingly, it came with a cost. Tracks don't get to keep as much of the simulcasting dollar as they do for live racing although overall handle has increased. Now on-track casino-style gaming is doing to racing handle (simulcast and live) what simulcasting did to live racing. Thornton recognizes this "potential" (it's more than potential) for "erosion" but offers no strategies for avoiding it.

The quality of racing is something Suffolk Downs and other struggling tracks need to confront. Horse racing has got to put its best product before the public as often as possible. Running 200-plus days a year mostly so struggling horsemen can make a living is a recipe for continuing mediocrity. What would happen if the New England Patriots played their second string for most of the game and only put in Tom Brady, Randy Moss and co. in the last five minutes? The fans would boo and then, after a while, they'd stop being fans. If the best way to get paying customers back to the racetrack to bet on racing is to shorten meets and boost purses then racing leaders should waste no time in doing this. The racetrack needs to cease being a welfare agency.

The Laffer Curve works in racing. Suffolk's original 1935 meet was only 28 days and crowds flocked to it. These days short meets at Saratoga, Keeneland, Del Mar, and Pimlico do bang-up business. A shortened time scale brings urgency and pagentry back to the races, something Thornton points out have slipped away from most tracks, replaced by numbing repetition of low-level races aimed at low-brow clientele whose mindset is summed up in (Thornton's phrase) "What the f... can I bet on next?"

Thornton speaks up for smaller stables and mid-level racing. To be sure not every race can or should be the Massachusetts Handicap (Suffolk's annual major stakes event) but the fact is that casual fans, bettors, and current and potential horse owners are losing interest in the lower end of the market. At the risk of sounding elitist, some folks in the maiden claimer colonies ought to consider finding something else to do.

Suffolk Downs is not leafy Saratoga or seaside Del Mar (as a training class incident related by Thornton well makes the point) but that doesn't mean Suffolk and other urban tracks are helpless. They can create new traditions (how about an opening day "Welcoming Back The Horses" parade from Revere Beach onto the Suffolk grounds?). Suffolk may have found its sweet spot for race dates -- 2007's reduced 100 days (May to November) produced impressive gains in handle and attendance for new owner Richard Fields. Yet Suffolk racing is now menaced by slow-death-by-casino as proposed by Fields.

Thornton's book pleasingly breaks down jargon. It offers insights aplenty. Example: Year-round racing destroyed handicap racing (that's not the only thing it ruined). What's most missing from "Not By A Long Shot" (hopefully, Thornton will tackle this in a future book) is a prescription for repositioning horse racing in American culture. Let me try:

Gambling is what used to be unique about horse racing but that is no longer true. The climate has shifted and racetracks need to focus on the uniqueness of the horses. Track managers and horsemen have to create a horse culture via new business combinations that treats gambling as subsidiary.

Las Vegas and Atlantic City are moving away from a gambling-centered culture in favor of a luxury-centered culture (fine dining, high-end shops). Horse racing needs to move to a rustic-centered culture emphasizing animals and the great outdoors. Racetracks should host horse auctions, dressage competitions, polo matches etc. to get people who already like horses interested in racing. Public sadness over the loss of open space and agriculture would fuel interest in horse racing's new rustic culture.

This will help blunt horse racing's big psychological problem with the public that Thornton gets close to when he writes about animal cruelty. Injuries to animals is a major liability to horse as well as dog racing. People don't fret about injuries to people in sports because it's acknowledged that people have free choice to participate or not. Animals don't have free choice. They're trained to race. Thus people are especially bothered by animal injuries, using phrases like "Why dothey (the royal "they") make them (the animals) do that?" People further reckon..."Since horse racing is mostly about raising money for government programs and we've got all this new fangled gambling now why not keep the animals safe by letting horse racing go into the dustbin of history?" It's a good argument. Flawless logic. And G-d help horse racing if it continues to wear the image of gambling-centered government cash cow.

There are no easy answers for horse racing. If the great sport survives it will be largely because of the energy and spirits of people movingly chronicled by Thornton such as injured jockey Rudy Baez; executive Lou Raffetto, whose plan to revive the MassCap "backfired" into appearances by the world's most successful horse -- Cigar -- in two consecutive runnings of Suffolk's big race; and backstretch "lifers" who get up early every day to tend the animals amid bleak circumstances. It will take boldness as well as love and belief in horse racing to revive Suffolk Downs. Hopefully, wise men such as T.D. Thornton will stay around and see it through.

James Mosher is a freelance writer who lives in Ledyard, Connecticut. His work on horse racing has appeared in Daily Racing Form, Blood-Horse magazine, Thoroughbred Times, and other publications.

Loved the book Thornton makes you feel like you know the place even if you have never been there.A great look at what goes on behind the scenes of a track..Highly recommend to anyone that enjoys the track.Great Job T.D.