Winner of Del Mar Fair Contest Was on Her Toes

In the realm of healthy, good-looking feet, Irene Soto’s are tops.

So said the podiatrist judge of the Del Mar Fair’s Happy Feet contest, held last Friday at the Picnic Stage.

A record 881,231 people showed up during the 18-day fair--many of them, no doubt, just itching to win the honor of “happiest feet.” But only one adult could claim the ribbon and Soto, 37, ran away with it.

“I was surprised. I did it just for the fun of it,” said Soto, a resident of Alpine. “It feels kind of nice to know you have nice feet.”

“They asked me to rate my toes from one to 10, and I said, ‘10!’ She asked me why, and I said it’s because I take care of them,” Soto said. “I’m proud of my toes.”

Soto was at the fair with her two children, her brother, her sister-in-law, her nephew, a friend and 75,642 other people Friday, setting a single day attendance record for the 107-year-old fair, which ended Sunday.

Overall, attendance at the fair easily broke the record of 842,401 set last year. Attendance at the fair has risen for each of the last seven years, said special projects coordinator Judy Sala.

Next year, the fair will be expanded to 19 days, Sala said, which could ease the fair’s most consistent problem: parking.

Still, parking at the fair this year “wasn’t bad . . . We never had a day where our lots were so full we couldn’t accommodate people,” Sala said.

The main obstacle was not finding a space in the parking lot, it was getting to the lot in the first place. A huge bottleneck formed near the fair on Interstate 5 each evening.

Sala said a new plan to let people park at Torrey Pines High School then bus them to the fair was “extremely well received. When it looked like people were going to have to wait for parking, we put out signs saying they could park at Torrey Pines.”

The lot’s 1,200 spaces were filled several times during the fair, Sala said.

The only other significant problems at the fair were complaints about sunburn and sore feet, Sala said.

Some of the fair’s highlights were a new aerospace exhibit, including a model of the space shuttle Challenger, and a concert by country-western singer George Strait, which attracted 20,500 people June 24. “That’s a record for our grandstand,” Sala said.

“We had a great entertainment line-up,” she said. “We also had a couple new rides this year and they were very well received. The new log ride--there were always lines for that.”

And of course, the new Happy Feet contest was a big hit. “This is a family fair. One of the things they did this year was to judge the best adult’s and the best kid’s feet,” Sala said.

Soto said her daughter, 12, and her son, 16, were impressed by her accomplishment. “My daughter was real proud,” she said, “and my son just giggled a lot.”