Member’s Resource – 2021 AQU Fall Meet Analysis

William Alempijevic
NYTHA Executive Director

Sunday, January 23, 2022

Member’s Resource – 2021 AQU Fall Meet Analysis

To our Members,

Starting with the 2021 Belmont Fall Meet, we provided an analysis looking closer at Handle, Purses, and Field Size. That email can be found HERE.

Below, you will find a detailed analysis of the 2021 Aqueduct Fall Meet that ended on Sunday, December 5, 2021.

That meet had a different schedule than 2019 and 2020 but was very successful, and you can read the NYRA end of meet press release HERE.

The major takeaways are as follows:

Three Race Days from the 2021 Aqueduct Meet (opening weekend) were transferred to Belmont, which is the reason for the year-over-year change. Those three days were included in the 2021 Belmont Fall analysis.
In 2019, the Aqueduct Fall Meet was a week longer. Those same Race Days are reflected in Aqueduct Winter Meet totals for both the 2020-21 and 2021-22 meets.
Handle averaged over $10M per Race Day at the 2021 Aqueduct Fall meet. A new record for Aqueduct.
Handle per betting interest has increased over 14% since 2019 to over $119,000 per BI at the recent Aqueduct meet.
Purses at Aqueduct averaged a record $84,200 per race in the Fall 2021 Meet. A 17% increase from 2019 and a 22% increase from 2020.
More races with competitive fields. In 2019, over 21% of races were contested with 6 or less betting interests, and this year, 11% of races had 6 or less BI.

Our membership continues to see the benefits of a strong racing program with rich purses and our customers are showing their support for our races with increases in handle.

Purses at all our NYRA tracks are predominantly funded through handle and the results from the Fall Meet are reassuring as we look forward to future meets.

We are glad to offer the same, strong purse structure as we continue through the Winter portion of the Aqueduct meet and we appreciate your support of the entry box.

We will continue to provide these summaries after each meet and please don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any questions.

Regards,

Will