by Trey Nosrac

Another New Year’s Eve is in the books. As the clock ticked toward midnight, the entertainment menu for harness racing fans and gamblers was thin gruel. New Year’s Eve is quirky, and we feel forced to have a great time. Forced good times are rarely good. On the other hand, we do not want to be fun sponges and sit at home reading War and Peace in front of a crackling fire – so we party on, which often ends badly.

A consistent culprit in resulting mayhem on the night of paper hats is excessive liquor intake by laypeople. There are a few examples from my memory bank.

The Bring Your Exotic Beverage party at Ronnie Lafarge’s condominium, where imported Sticky Rice Moonshine did not mix well with crab dip, or Roger Benton’s New Year’s Eve yachting party on the Bay of Biscayne in Miami, which resulted in seasickness and projectile vomiting. Then there was a lovely dinner with semi-friends when we discovered during Crème Brulé that our new friends were firm members of the opposite political persuasion, and midnight was four hours away. Of course, no one in attendance will forget the Twister game at the family reunion New Year’s party in St. Petersburg, which resulted in a fistfight and subsequent lawsuit.

The two best New Year’s Eves were in 2000 and 2020. Remember when the calendar flipped to triple zeros, and we all thought the computers would shut down and the world would end? It was a letdown when no chaos ensued, but the entire night was exciting. Twenty years later, in 2020, COVID-19 was in the air, another exciting time when the possible extinction of humans spiced up New Year’s Eve.

Staying home on New Year’s Eve can be a bit of a drag. Our options for remaining on the couch for New Year’s Eve are limited. The 300 channels offer an incredibly skimpy menu of offerings on television, including a few unimportant football games, where two colleges we have never heard of battle for the “Fruit Bowl,” and reruns of old movies that we have all but memorized. Spending hour after hour in front of the screen viewing unfamiliar musical acts and listening to talking heads wearing extravagant makeup and clothing. And finally, the ball drops.

While New Year’s Eve of 2024 is fresh in my mind, allow a suggestion for 2025 — a single harness race to be livestreamed nationally. Why not create a fun attempt to fill the entertainment void and introduce new citizens to our sport? For planning purposes, let’s use the anacronym NYEGHH Day (New Year’s Eve Great Harness Horse Day). I do not want to overthink this, but here are a few building blocks for such a show:

• Start the show at about 10:30 so the audience will have 90 minutes of tease before the race begins.

• NYEGHH Day will be a free live entertainment option that can be streamed commercial-free.

• Every 10 minutes will be a three-minute segment where we meet one of the racehorses, the trainer, the groom, or the owner. The host/interviewer will discuss offbeat topics such as how the horse was named or how these people came into the horse’s orbit.

• Hosts can decide whether this is a sanctioned race or an unofficial invitational.

• One possibility is inviting select horses of equal ability who have not earned a dime racing in their career. This single race will receive a stipend based on the finish, making this race an unofficial event and a charitable contribution.

• Keep the single harness race show light and peppy.

• Drop in a musical act who cover songs such as: A Horse With No Name (America), Wild Horses (The Rolling Stones), White Horse (Taylor Swift), Beer for My Horses (Toby Keith), and Riders on the Storm (The Doors).

• Make the single harness race a fun event, nothing serious, and easily accessible for newbies to the sport. One never knows when we will recruit a new voice in our choir.

• Possibly include a couple of short segments where visitors can receive a few dollops of information on the upcoming race, such as the distance and gait.

• Always have a countdown clock somewhere on the screen.

• Attractive hosts of both sexes explain the basics of the sport during a stop-action, 3-D video of an actual race.

• Take some quick video call-ins where the caller tells where they are from and what drove them to this show.

• Invite influencers who may want attention and can direct traffic to the show.

• Keep ratcheting up drama for the race that will leave the starting gate at exactly 11:58 and finish at midnight.

• Then, at midnight, near the finish line, show a joyful little group celebrating and awaiting the return of ALL the competing horses and connections to the winner’s circle. Add funny hats and confetti to create a fun little equine gathering with champagne bottles popping.

A NYEGHH Day show of this ilk would be fun to present, participate in, and watch. The competition for attention is weak in the final hours of each year, so a live-streamed harness race, the racing people, and the surrounding threads of a horse race could be a unique, promising new niche. I would watch this presentation and recommend it to acquaintances.

Best of all, I will not be on a boat or close to crab dip.

Happy New Year,

Trey