All hail Hialeah, may she live to race again

Far as horse racing news goes, it really couldn't get much better than this.

John Brunetti, owner of the defunct Hialeah Park race track in Florida, believes racing will return to that once-spectacular venue that was picture-postcard-perfect (inset) in its heyday.

Brunetti was quoted by bloodhorse.com as saying Hialeah will be back in business "as soon as possible." Hialeah issued a press release on the track's pink-flamingo letterhead for the first time in years, the site reported, noting that the facility had been granted a permit to host Quarter Horse racing and that officials including Brunetti and his son, John Jr., had trekked to Oklahoma's Remington Park to learn the ropes of hosting races for cow ponies. (No griping from the QH people; I love your horses, too!)

Hialeah's Quarter Horse permit, granted in March, requires the track to begin hosting races within a year. Former Florida state Rep. Luis Rojas, who lobbies on behalf of Hialeah in the legislature, estimated the cost of renovations at $40 million to $90 million, though Internet multimillionaire Halsey Minor, who tried to buy the track from Brunetti to refurbish it and was rebuffed, told The Miami Herald the cost would be more like "one hundred and twenty million bucks. It's in really bad shape ... you can see the bones."

Remington -- with slot machines driving purses for Quarter Horse racing to a stellar $265,577 per night -- ended its Quarter Horse meeting May 31 by reporting increases in both on-track attendance and handle. The latter was up 4.9 percent over 2008, this despite a recession.

The Blood-Horse reports that recent Florida legislation has opened the possibility of slot machines at Hialeah, which had initially been specifically written-out of voter-approved initiatives that permitted slots elsewhere in the Sunshine State. Hialeah has been closed since 2001, when it shuttered the place after losing a series of disputes about racing dates with competing Calder Race Course and Gulfstream Park. But with slots -- and bigger plans -- Brunetti thinks Hialeah can again give the other contenders a run for their money.

"Since Hialeah already has an existing facility," the press release stated, "we are moving forward with plans to refurbish the track and return to racing as soon as possible."

"It is our hope that the new Hialeah Park will not be limited to Quarter Horse Racing," said John Brunetti Jr. "We also envision adding a casino, a card room with poker and dominoes, and slot machines, along with 'Class A' Thoroughbred racing."

Florida law ... and this is interesting ... has an allowance for "poker rooms" specifically at Quarter Horse tracks. Go figure.

I can't picture a more rewarding site for horse racing right now than a renovated Hialeah Park -- pink flamingoes and all -- playing host to throngs of gamblers, be they horseplayers, card-players, or slot-handle-pullers. The city of Hialeah is probably thinking the same thing. Officials there said that more than 9,000 job applications have already been submitted in hopes of gaining employment at the reopened track.

Certainly Hialeah Park is a national treasure. Construction originally began in 1921 under the ownership, among others, of aviation pioneer Glenn Curtiss. It survived a 1926 hurricane and in 1930 was sold to wealthy Philly horseman Joseph Early Widener. Hialeah Park in 1932 installed the first totalisator in the United States -- the device was imported from Australia -- to facilitate parimutuel wagering. The track features some of the nation's most striking architecture; it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979; and, it was also the setting during 1987 of most of the principal photography for one of my favorite flicks, the Richard Dreyfuss picture "Let It Ride."

For more on the racetrack, visit "Save Hialeah Park," which touts the track as among the "11 most endangered historic places in America." It ain't the most-updated site in the world, but there's some interesting Hialeah Park information there. Also be sure to check out this photo essay on the track since its closure, and this Myspace page dedicated to saving Hialeah.

And if people in or around Inglewood, Calif., had that sort of interest in their local track, maybe Hollywood Park wouldn't, as it now seems, be doomed.

But there's still some trepidation regarding Hialeah's resurrection. Minor thinks Brunetti doesn't have the bucks to do the job. And Ray Paulick noted in 2008 that Brunetti's management of Hialeah was far from the sharpest.

Let's hope that the combination of a Quarter Horse permit (requiring new stables as the original ones were demolished) and gambing that includes poker and slots (to reward renovation of the front-side facilities) will get Hialeah back on its feet.

It would be nice to see the track back in action, flamingoes and all, and to see Hialeah make a serious case for good race dates -- the kind of case Brunetti couldn't make in the past.

Pray for Rene

I ventured away from technology for 20 hours Sunday to visit the beach with my family and upon my return, only one item from the horse racing world merits my foremost attention.

I offer prayers for Rene Douglas, who is likely to be permanently paralyzed in his lower extremities after a spill aboard the 4-year-old A.P. Indy filly Born to Be in the Grade 3 Arlington Matron Handicap. I urge anyone who believes in a higher power to do the same.

Douglas' filly was bumped by a second horse, clipped heels with another, somersaulted throwing Douglas to the track, and landed with her full weight on the jockey. Though Born To Be continued to lie upon Douglas after the crash, apparently it was mostly to gather her wits. She reportedly had to be pulled off Douglas so that he could be treated, but after an ambulance-van ride back to the barn, Born to Be was said to have "recovered" from the fall, according to The Blood-Horse, which cited Douglas' agent, Dennis Cooper. 

(Edit: The Daily Racing form now reports that Born to Be was euthanized later at Arlington Park. ... RIP, talented one, and my condolences to the connections.)

Cooper said doctors "gave it straight" to him after seven hours of surgery, saying that Douglas is unlikely ever to walk again. A 42-year-old native of Panama, Douglas has nearly 3,600 North American victories as a jockey, and his mounts have earned more than $102 million. He was the regular rider for 2-year-old filly champion Dreaming of Anna, and won the 1996 Belmont Stakes aboard Editor's Note.

Douglas and his wife, Natalia, have three sons, Michael, Giancarlo and Christian. They'll all need our prayers.

Moments such as this serve to remind us of the sacrifices being made by the men, women and animals who make this game possible.

I hope the early prognosis is unduly dire and that Rene Douglas is someday able to walk. Of course it's likely that even if that happens, he's done with riding.

Either way, it's fair to look back on his career his career at this point, and I would contend he was one of the top riders of his era. His is not necessarily one of the names that race fans and handicappers would list when naming the greatest recent jockeys; he's just the guy whose horses beat their horses about as often as theirs beat his.

Douglas twice won 11 stakes races in a season at Arlington Park (2002 and 2007), a record he shares with the likes of Kennard Knapp (1965), Pat Day (1981) and Jorge Velasquez (1989). He won six riding titles at Arlington Park, where in 2003 he won seven races on a single card, and he was tied for the leading rider title at the Chicago track in the early going this year. Douglas also won three riding titles at Calder and Hialeah, setting a single-season win mark at the latter.

In the irons, especially at Arlington, Rene Douglas was money.

Get well, Rene. I'll keep you and your family in my prayers.

(Visit Rene's Web site at http://renedouglas.com/.)