A Excellent Article about the Southern California Circuit by Ed Z.

 The veteran trainer repeated that Southern California horsemen desperately need this meeting and the turf racing, but he added that they need something else, too. A break.

“We’re over raced, we need breaks,” he said. “The horses need breaks. The trainers need breaks. The gamblers need breaks. This Racing Board better get its act together and figure out it’s just a constant grind to go from the beginning of the year to the end of the year without some time off, not even a week off in the schedule.”

Alan Balch, executive director of the California Thoroughbred Trainers, agreed with Puype, but offered reasons for the amount of racing.

“Almost everybody agrees there’s too much racing, not enough horses, but once you set the schedules, it’s hard to reduce them because so many people depend on them for employment, investments in private tracks, breeders, and on and on and on,” Balch said. “With international simulcasting someone will race and someone else will be handling that money. That’s what tends to drive the number of racing dates.”

Balch and Puype like the way Del Mar has set up its meeting with four days of racing starting next week. Balch said it will set Del Mar up well for the Breeders’ Cup in 2017 and for simulcast racing when the Breeders’ Cup is at Keeneland next year.

Read the full article at  http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/nov/08/del-mar-let-it-ride-stakes/