Harness racing handle, purses and race dates were all down in 2024, but were, essentially, on par with the last five years.

by Brett Sturman

Reviewing wagering and purse statistics from the United States Trotting Association’s (USTA) published set of economic indicators for 2024, numbers are down slightly but consistently across the board year-over-year when compared to 2023.

But what does that exactly mean, if anything? What are the causes? What can we predict about how those numbers may move going forward?

Total harness racing handle from 2024 was $1.471 billion, down over 7 per cent from 2023’s total of $1.585 billion. Those numbers are somewhat of a function of fewer days in 2024 (down from 3,218 in 2023 to 3,149 in 2024), though handle dropped more than race days by an additional 5 per cent. Even the usually industry-reliable metric of purses was down slightly too, dipping below the $500 million mark set in 2023 to a little below $492 million in 2024.

If just strictly comparing year-over-year you could say the numbers aren’t great, but looking at it in a broader context does show somewhat of a different perspective.

Shorter term, going back to 2019 – the last full year of racing before the pandemic-impacted year of 2020 and subsequent post-pandemic surge of metrics in 2021, the economic indicators are no worse than they were five years ago.

In 2019, total handle was $1.425 billion. 2024’s handle as cited above reflects a 3 per cent increase since that time. What has dropped by a noticeable amount since that time is the number of race days (3,424 in 2019 to 3,149 in 2024), which is probably the most concerning number. Though, in the paradox that is harness racing economics, even as race dates decline, purses go up. Total purses, which have averaged close to $500 million over these past two years, remain well up from the 2019 figures of just shy of $440 million.

As usual, the impact that racing at The Meadowlands has on the industry cannot be overstated. In figures provided by The Meadowlands to HRU, live handle plus export handle (not including non-comingled pools) was over $264 million, which makes up 17.98 per cent of the entire industries handle. This is remarkable, considering that at just 89 race dates for the year, The Meadowlands’ number of dates is just 2.83 per cent of the total industry number yet. The last time I did a similar analysis was three years ago and at that time The Meadowlands reflected 17.25 per cent of the entire industry handle, so The Meadowlands continues to exceed in doing its part to buoy the total industry numbers.

Of course, harness racing doesn’t operate in a vacuum and many of its challenges are shared with its thoroughbred industry counterpart, speaking to the state of overall racing as a whole.

In numbers released Friday (Jan. 3) from Equibase, thoroughbred handle was down 3.4 per cent between the recently concluded 2024 and prior year 2023. Just like harness racing, despite the decline in wagering and a decline in race days (down 2.4 per cent), paid purses ticked upwards ever so slightly. After seeing its highest handle post-pandemic in 2021 in 12 years, that industries’ handle has now dropped for the fourth straight year. Harness racing, albeit working with wagering volumes at a tenth of what the thoroughbred industry handles, has seen more of an upward trend over that period despite the decline in 2024.

Analyzing handle is the most direct way to gauge bettor engagement, but it’s not even close to measuring the health of the industry. That, you could argue, is between race days and purses and at some point, those two metrics won’t any longer be able to move in opposite directions.

Contraction of the industry through declining race days will continue to move in that direction as tracks are continuing to close. In searching through race replays over the past 14 years in preparation for a recent column on Southwind Amazon, it’s amazing to see the list of tracks that appeared in the race replay queue that are no longer here.

Balmoral, Maywood, Pompano, all tracks in Michigan, almost all tracks in Maine, a bunch of ones I totally forgot even weren’t racing anymore from the Midwest – the list goes on and continues most recently with historic Freehold now added to that list just from one week ago. Even The Meadowlands, which continues to carry the industry with numbers as cited above, has declining race dates. The Big M’s 89 race dates from last year are down close to 50 per cent from the number of race dates they add in the early 2000’s per the NJRC’s annual racing reports from those times.

For now, total purse numbers are holding their own, but my sense is that these numbers are driven from increased stakes purses and the problem there is that those purses benefit only a select few. You only have to open up any program from 10 years ago and you can see the purse reductions in overnight races at almost any track.

And though not a formal “economic indicator” as tracked with handle, dates and purses, public sales results should be included also in analysis when looking at the state of the industry.

As purses at the higher ends remain healthy, it’s no coincidence that sales results for high-end horses remain healthy too. The major sales this past year at Lexington and at Harrisburg continued to perform exceedingly well, especially with the highest quality yearlings. However, sales struggled more noticeably once in the middle market types. All of which seems to align with the dynamic of a coalescing of purses offered for the best horses against a declining set of race dates and purses elsewhere.

It remains to be seen where these numbers will head in the upcoming year.