A conversation with Jim Whelan
by Murray Brown
Jim Whelan is a generational horseperson proud and true. He is the son of a horseman who raced in Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia during the warmer months and throughout Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts at times when racing was down in the Maritimes.
“I’ve never known anything but being around horses and being involved in the horse business,” Whelan said.
Like so many Maritimers involved in our sport, Whelan, in effect, heeded the advice of Horace Greeley and as a young man headed west, specifically to Ontario, more specifically to Flamboro Downs. It was in 1979 following his move to Flamboro Downs that we pick up the tale of Whelan’s harness racing career.
You’ve done most everything in this great sport of ours, beginning, as most have done, as a groom, then becoming a trainer, a driver, a sometime breeder and numerous other equine pursuits, but it is as an advocate for horsepeople and your involvement with the Ontario Harness Horse Association (OHHA) through which you are perhaps best known.
“I’m still very much involved with most of the facets of our sport. I still groom some of my own horses. I breed a few. I have my own farm and training center. I maintain my training track. We have about 20 head on the farm, somewhat equally divided between harness and pleasure horses. In addition to training them, my wife and I enjoy riding. I’m actually consistently down to drive a horse named Ten Carat Garrett that we own at Mohawk on Saturday evenings. This particular horse means a lot to us. He is named for our son whom we lost from a brain tumor in 2023. In addition to my immediate horse related activities, I am also president of the Ontario Harness Horse Association and the Ontario Equine Education and Employment Program (OEEEP). OHHA is an office I have proudly represented during various times in the past 40 years. I’ve been back in the chair since 2013. I am also an elected director of Standardbred Canada, our national breeding register.”
(Editor’s note: For clarity, the official representative of Ontario’s harness horsepeople at the province’s racetracks is the Central Ontario Standardbred Association (COSA))
From a personal perspective how are you doing today?
“I suppose that many looking in might say that I’m not in the best of health. I’m 70 years old. I have lived a good life, and horses have played a major role. I’m currently awaiting a double lung transplant. I have a condition called pulmonary fibrosis. It’s a hereditary disease, which when, taken to its conclusion, results in the lungs rendered non-functional. Thus, the need for the transplant. If and when a new set of lungs become available, my family and I will be in the hands of God and the best doctors at the University of Toronto. All we can do is hope for the best.”
What is your role as president of OHHA?
“Broadly, I would say it is to represent, promote and protect horsepeople and our rights. That includes helping horsepeople whose livelihood has and continues to be threatened by overzealous, uninformed politicos and bureaucrats who have proven over and over not to have the slightest idea of what horse racing and the equine agricultural industry provides for our communities and our economy. We must make it our joint mission to self-sustain and promote our industry, rather than watch it be diminished to irrelevance or worse, disappear altogether.”
Could you please expand upon that?
“Under the present construct, our collective industry future appears bleak. Here in Ontario, the regulator just eliminated 45 race days, with the probability of even more in the future. As I speak, Rideau Carleton Raceway — located in our nation’s capital, Ottawa; a 60-plus-year venue — has been immediately closed by its gaming owner Hard Rock. So, yet another 70 plus race dates wiped out.
“The province of Quebec, previously a bastion of Canadian harness racing is down to only 40 or so race days, none in Montreal, the largest city in the province. British Columbia no longer has any form of horse racing. For all intents and purposes Saskatchewan, and Newfoundland have no sustained forms of horse racing. Manitoba has a 10-day meet and New Brunswick schedules 11 race dates. Alberta continues to soldier on. Nova Scotia’s racing is only a shadow of what it once was. Prince Edward Island, our smallest province, to their credit is the only province, having established two new gaming and racing facilities, that has shown any growth in recent years.”
Why is that happening?
“There are likely many reasons. But in my opinion the major one is industry leadership or lack thereof. By every metric the current leadership has failed. Wagering, attendance, purses, breeding, participants and opportunity are all down dramatically, while costs skyrocket. Make no mistake, there is zero alignment between gaming and racing. Arguably, we are competing interests, so assigning the future of horse racing to gaming executives is clearly counter-intuitive to creating a path to a sustainable future for the equine agricultural industry. The current structural model makes absolutely no sense, unless of course the goal is to completely end the horse racing industry.”
So what is the solution?
“Genuine representational unity and self-determination. From my perspective, it’s time for horsepeople to band together under a horse-person-centric banner to promote and advocate for our industry. Billions of dollars and thousands of agricultural industry jobs are at stake. It is time for a new model designed for self-sustainability. Pari-mutuel wagering on its own cannot support the industry. Gaming has forever changed that. As such, gaming has to be part of the solution. Therefore, we are calling for a new model and business plan to sustain and grow the equine agricultural industry; one built upon a not-for-profit equine agricultural center, its leadership composed of democratically elected people that have a vested interest in the industry. This long-term business plan would partner with key government stakeholders to reinvest revenues right back into the equine industry. The physical plant would encompass a complete equine agricultural entertainment and educational center and a raceway and amenities designed for all breeds. Only then will the industry find itself on a real path to sustenance. Without this paradigm structural shift, horse racing and horsepeople will continue to circle the drain into financial oblivion.”
