Atlantic City Race Course
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Atlantic City Race Course is a thoroughbred horse race track located in the Mays Landing section of Hamilton Township, in Atlantic County, New Jersey, United States. The track is located off the Black Horse Pike (U.S. Route 322) next to the Hamilton Mall. Despite the name, the facility is located 14 miles from Atlantic City.
The main track is 1⅛ miles in length and 100 feet wide, with a 7 furlong chute. The stretch portion of the main track is 947.29 feet. The turf course is a 100-foot wide, one mile oval, 100 feet wide. The stands offer a a seating capacity of 10,000, with standing room available for 25,000.
[edit] History
Atlantic City Race Course opened its doors on July 22, 1946, the work of a group of four individuals. The most famous of the group was John B. Kelly, Sr., who created the race course together with Fred C. Scholler, Glendon Robertson and James "Sonny" Fraser. Kelso, considered to be among the best racehorses of the Twentieth century, made his two-year-old debut on September 4, 1959. at Atlantic City Race Course, at that time one of the country's premier tracks.
Over 60 years ago, John B. Kelly realized a dream to establish a thoroughbred race track near the resort town of Atlantic City. With the help of celebrities such as Bob Hope and Frank Sinatra, Atlantic City Race Course became the place to be seen at. By the late 1970's the addition of the casinos on the boardwalk meant a slow but sure death for the racecourse. Despite the good intentions and efforts of its owners, Atlantic City Race Course could not operate profitably as attendance and handle dropped off year by year. In 2001, the track was sold to the owners of Philadelphia Park and is now essentially a simulcast facility on over 250 acres of land. From 2001 to today, Greenwood Racing/Philadelphia Park has been conducting 4 day race meets at ACRC. ACRC is scheduled to run 4 days again in 2007 and may run additional dates in the future.
On November 16, 2006 Hal Handel, CEO of Greenwood Racing, announced that the Atlantic City Race Course would increase live racing dates from 4 days per year, to up to 20 days per year. Many people in the local community believe that between the renewed interest in ACRC and the website founded by Eric Kalet in 2005, www.saveacrc.com has been largely responsible for Handel's decision to ramp up horse racing at ACRC. [www.saveacrc.com] has been actively involved in expanding racing at the Atlantic City Race Course and created the movement to bring full time racing back to ACRC in 2005. See article in the Press of Atlantic City, Region section, July 30, 2005.
