Post by the believer on Apr 22, 2011 17:23:35 GMT -5
Some dark days for harness racing by Dave Briggs Thu Apr 21 2011
It’s been an awful couple of weeks in harness racing.
A young woman was killed on the backstretch of a track in Illinois.
The sport’s biggest track was pushed to the brink of closure.
Even undefeated horse St Elmo Hero tasted defeat for the first time.
In fact, the horse and the dead woman, Michelle Eustis, shared a strong link. St Elmo Hero is trained by her father, Chuck Eustis III.
Saturday at Woodbine Racetrack, in Toronto, St Elmo Hero, driven by Jody Jamieson, of Moffat, lost a shoe early in his race and was nosed out at the wire by Art Professor, driven by Mark MacDonald, of Cambridge. It was the first loss for St Elmo Hero in 26 career starts.
Five days prior, Michelle Eustis, 25, was allegedly struck and killed by a truck.
Her boyfriend is charged in connection with the incident. Angus Lake, 41 is charged with four counts of aggravated driving under the influence.
Prosecutors allege Lake drank five or six shots at a barn party at Balmoral Park, in Crete, Ill., early on April 11 after the Sunday night race card. Sometime before dawn, Michelle Eustis and her friend, Heather France, took a horse bareback riding. Around 5 a.m., Lake went looking for the women. His pickup truck collided with the horse. Michelle died from head trauma. France required surgery for a broken leg. The horse lived, but allegedly suffered bumps, bruises and a gouge on its back.
Michelle Eustis leaves behind a six-year-old daughter.
All this came the same week the union representing tellers at the Meadowlands Racetrack in New Jersey refused to vote April 14 on whether to accept concessions to finalize a deal to privatize the track.
New York City real estate mogul Jeff Gural is trying to acquire the Meadowlands from the State of New Jersey.
April 15 was the deadline imposed by the state for Gural to finalize the deal. He had completed the necessary financing of $100 million — what he called “the hard part” of the deal — but needed to secure concessions from various unions representing track employees.
Gural said he was prepared to lose $10-12 million over the next few years while a new, high-tech, smaller grandstand was constructed, but he wasn’t prepared to lose $20 million by honouring existing union contracts.
He received concessions from all but the tellers’ union.
The next day, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie issue a statement saying the failure of the union to vote meant live racing at the Meadowlands would not resume May 7 as previously scheduled and simulcasting at the track would cease as of May 12.
But there still may be hope harness racing’s most important track can be saved. Gural, sensing the tellers’ union did not fully understand the implications — essentially take a 20 per cent pay cut or a 100 per cent one — managed to secure a meeting Wednesday with union leadership.
“I think that many of the tellers did not understand our offer and hopefully by listening to their issues and clarifying some of ours we can get this process back on track,” Gural said, in a statement. “I personally met with many of the tellers prior to the vote and I found most of them very supportive and willing to work with us so I am cautiously optimistic.”
I hope that turns out to be the one piece of good news in an otherwise dreadful couple of weeks