Colonial Downs invitations horsemen throughout the nation to find if their Thoroughbred, bred exterior of Virginia, qualifies as Virginia Licensed; due to this fact, eligible to enter within the many Virginia-Restricted races. Any horse that maintained residency in Virginia for a minimum of a six-month consecutive interval previous to December 31 of its 2-year-old 12 months qualifies. There are 46 Virginia-Restricted races within the first guide alone. Throughout the nine-week 2024 Colonial Downs racing season, greater than $2.4 million in non-stakes purses are up for grabs.
“We frequently hear from house owners and trainers who didn’t know their horse qualifies for our Virginia Restricted races,” mentioned Gary Palmisano, Government Director of Racing for Churchill Downs. “The foundations are distinctive to what you discover in different states in that the groundwork to turn into eligible is completed early in a horse’s profession, so horses claimed or purchased at public sale might the truth is be eligible unbeknownst to the present connections. I might simply encourage trainers and house owners to double verify their eligibility in order that they will reap the benefits of this implausible alternative.”Â
The Virginia Thoroughbred Affiliation has diligently saved observe of all Virginia-certified, Virginia-sired, and Virginia-bred Thoroughbreds, and horsemen can reap the advantages by following the hyperlink to verify if their horse qualifies. For simple use, it’s sorted by coach.
“If the horse wasn’t named once we registered it, then it isn’t named within the database,” mentioned Debbie Easter, Government Director of the Virginia Thoroughbred Affiliation. “If they do not discover it by title, then they should seek for it by the dam’s title and the date of delivery.”
On the web site, one can merely verify the field for “Virginia-Licensed” on the prime of the web page, then both search by horse’s title, dam’s title and date of delivery, or view an inventory of all registered horses alphabetically.Join BloodHorse Each day
Created in 2016 by the Virginia Thoroughbred Affiliation, the Virginia Licensed program incentives horsemen to boost and practice their Thoroughbreds within the Commonwealth. It has been integral to respiration life into Virginia’s horse business. In a not too long ago performed financial examine, it was discovered that this system has generated $86.2 million in financial advantages for the state.
“What this has accomplished is save our business’s infrastructure in Virginia,” Easter mentioned. “Our farms have been going away. Our coaching facilities and our farms that elevate younger horses have been going away. We have been shedding veterinarians, blacksmiths, everybody you want for the horse business. We designed this licensed program with hopes of bringing 400 horses to Virginia every foal crop. It’s bringing extra like 800 to 900. It has been an enormous savior to our farms.”
The Virginia Licensed program has awarded $14.6 million to house owners since 2016. The Virginia Proprietor’s Purse Bonus awards house owners of Virginia-bred and Virginia-sired horses a 50% purse bonus for horses ending 1st by 4th in all open races. When a Virginia-Restricted horse wins an open firm race, the Virginia Developer’s Purse Bonus provides as much as a 25% purse bonus to that horse’s developer (the proprietor of the horse when it makes its first lifetime begin).
“Our farms are hiring folks, they’re making capital enhancements, they’re capable of elevate their charges,” Easter mentioned. “Virginia was once one of many largest breeding states within the nation, however once we started this program, we have been right down to about 100 foals a 12 months. In these seven years that we have been registering licensed horses, we have gotten over 5,000 horses in our program. We have put the identical quantity of licensed horses on farms in Virginia because the breeding program has over the past 20 years. These are the gorgeous issues about what we’re doing.”
These 5,000 and counting Virginia Licensed horses are eligible to enter within the Virginia Restricted races at Colonial Downs, and the purses are run for 15% greater than the open firm races.
Opening day at Colonial Downs is Thursday, July 11. The primary situation guide may be discovered on-line.
This press launch has not been edited by BloodHorse. If there are any questions please contact the group that produced the discharge.
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