Del Mar Plays a $1-Million Drawing Card : Race: Officials hope Pacific Classic will keep fans coming.

DEL MAR —  Opening day here always has been one of the county’s biggest parties.

The problem for the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club has been how to keep the festivities going. And how to keep the fans--whom Joe Harper, the club’s president, calls “part beach-goer, not the hard-core bettor you get at Santa Anita”--coming back for the meeting’s remaining 42 days.

Harper thinks he, John Mabee and the rest of the board of directors have come up with a solution.

They’ll lure not only the beach-goers, but also the serious horse player and the top thoroughbreds by creating a spectacle.

They’ll do that by putting up a $1-million purse for Saturday’s inaugural running of the Pacific Classic.

“You know,” Harper said, “Santa Anita was the first track in the country to have a $100,000 race and that was about 20 years ago. But I think at that time you could buy more with $100,000 than you can today with $1 million.”

That’s not so, at least not as far as publicity is concerned. Del Mar is receiving a wealth of coverage for its $1 million.

ABC will televise the race nationally, a first for Del Mar. Reporters will fly in from around the country. Area newspapers will provide expanded coverage.

“It’s drawing a lot of attention,” Mabee said. “That’s why we’re putting it on.”

But it’s not as though Del Mar is treading on uncharted territory. Arlington Park near Chicago staged the first $1-million race Aug. 22, 1981. Now, only days short of a decade later, the question is what took Del Mar so long?

Both Harper and Mabee say the reason has to do with the track’s short season. A 43-day handle had made a $1-million race financially unfeasible.

“We have a short meet,” Mabee said, “so it really isn’t a wise thing to do, to put on a million-dollar race.”

But it was getting to be that Del Mar couldn’t afford to ignore the merits of a $1-million purse.

Since Arlington put on the first such race, more than 100 have been held throughout the country. There are also several $500,000 races each year.

And Del Mar was there with a few races in the $300,000 range.

There’s no need to guess which track began getting sidestepped by owners and trainers of the top thoroughbreds.

Mabee noticed the trend and began championing his million-dollar idea.

“John Mabee has been pushing for this for three or four years now,” Harper said. “He’s wanted one for so long and now we’re finally in a position to put on a million-dollar race.”

Since intertrack wagering was established in 1988, Del Mar has become the biggest success story on the thoroughbred circuit. Last season, its average daily mutuel handle of $7.5 million was largest in the nation.

Suddenly, a $1-million race was affordable.

But there was still a hurdle. His name was Joe Harper.

“What I didn’t want to do,” Harper said, “was just do a million-dollar race. If you have a big day, offer a big incentive, it’s just going to take away (in terms of attendance and handle) from the other days around it.

“If you’re going to have 45,000 people for a one-day special event, you’re going to find a smaller crowd the next day. You’ll find all you’re really doing is rearranging the crowd. When all is said and done, the weekend gate is still 45,000 and you’ve spent all this extra money.”

To please Harper and get around that potential problem, the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club has scheduled a week of special events. The Pacific Classic Festival began Monday.

The week includes two concerts, a charity golf tournament, volleyball exhibitions, a yearling sale, street entertainment, a food festival and an equestrian art show.

There also will be racing. The $300,000 Eddie Read Handicap will be Sunday. The $75,000 Escondido Handicap will be run today, and the $100,000 San Clemente Handicap will be part of Saturday’s card.

The board of directors also had to ensure they would attract a top field. There was little doubt they could, what with $1 million at stake, but still there was the matter of scheduling it far enough in advance of the Arlington Million so as not to conflict with that turf race in early September.

It was decided that the Pacific Classic would be run on dirt in early August.

To get the big-name horses, it would be contested by thoroughbreds 3 years old and up.

Early on, a sprint was favored over the classic distance of 1 1/4 miles, but only because Del Mar’s set-up did not suit 1 1/4-mile races.

Nevertheless, the board of directors kept pushing for the longer race. Despite several arguments to the contrary, it was decided to add a second finish line about 90 feet down the stretch from the original finish. That would allow the Pacific Classic to be run at 1 1/4 miles.

“Hollywood Park did the same thing,” Mabee said. “And it caused a lot of consternation. There were jockeys not seeing the right finish line. They would start celebrating victories with about an eighth of a mile still to go in the race. They eventually eliminated the second finish line.

“But we decided to go ahead and do it anyway.”

Now Mabee and Harper want their newest race to grow to the same stature as has their track. They’re even talking about the Pacific Classic in the context of the Kentucky Derby.

“The Derby has been going on for 117 years,” Mabee said. “And it’s a happening. That’s what we’re trying to do here. I’m sure the Derby 117 years ago wasn’t what it is today. But just give us a little time, give us four or five years, and we’ll put on a show.”

Harper drew a similar comparison.

“The Derby historically is the big one,” he said. “Even if there’s just a bunch of bums running in it, it’s still the Derby and people still want to go.

“It’s a little like opening day at Del Mar. Everyone wants to be at opening day. You can have all bad races, but still everyone wants to come out to Del Mar.

“Now if you can get both things going for you, the spectacle and good horses, then you know you’ve done your homework.”