OFF-TRACK WINDFALL : Despite Big Drop in Attendance and Betting, Del Mar Will Join Satellite Tracks in Winner’s Circle

As Del Mar’s first season under the influence of off-track betting winds down to its final days, there are apparently more winners than losers, a situation seldom found at a race track.

When the 43-day season ends Wednesday, the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club, a non-dividend paying group that leases the fairgrounds here, may gross $2.5 million just from off-track betting, despite precipitous drops in both track attendance and wagering.

Hollywood Park and Santa Anita, the kingpins of a 10-site satellite-television network that offers off-track betting on the Del Mar races, are expected to gross about $1.2 million on wagering alone. There should be additional profits for these facilities from admission, parking and concessions.

Although purse money derived from off-track betting is only about half of what it would be from betting at the track, horsemen will also benefit, as will the state of California, which gets a share.

The merchants of Del Mar--innkeepers, restaurant owners and others--have not suffered as a whole, even though the average track crowd is about 3,800 lower than a year ago. Only the seasonal real estate market seems to have slumped.

“Usually, business comes to them,” said one Del Mar restaurateur. “This summer, they’ve had to go out and find it.”

Fans attending the races at the track have been better off, too, since there have been shorter betting lines and not as many traffic jams.

The only question about off-track betting is whether, after a fast start, it will fade. In other words, how deep are the pockets of those horseplayers who are now betting regularly year-round instead of just concentrating on their favorite track when it’s open? When Hollywood Park and Santa Anita run, there is television betting on their races at Del Mar and several other Southern California facilities.

One thing is certain: Although New York’s off-track betting system, which started in 1971, has never developed the way politicians hoped, California’s setup has been an instant hit. Not by accident, California has profited by correcting mistakes that were made by the off-track bureaucrats at the start in New York. Some of these marketing errors still retard the system there.

One advantage that the California tracks have is being able to control their own destiny for the most part. In New York, off-track betting was force-fed to the tracks.

There, patrons were betting on horses by letter of the alphabet, instead of numbers, and they were given dirty, poorly maintained betting shops that offered no seating and no live telecasts of the races.

Worse, there was a 5% surcharge on off-track payoffs, an onerous policy that sometimes can amount to even more of a takeout because of double breakage--the money a bettor loses when a track and an off-track facility both round off the mutuel prices to the nearest dime.

For instance, a $2 daily double at Belmont Park recently paid $157, but was worth only $149 for the same bet off-track.

California’s off-track sites are patterned more after Teletrack in New Haven, Conn. In a state where betting on live horse races isn’t legal, New Haven has a theater-style facility that seats more than 4,000, including a dining room that accommodates hundreds, and conducts betting on New York’s thoroughbred and harness races. General Instruments, which built the original, plans to open a second Teletrack in the Hartford area.

In California, off-track payoffs are the same as they are at the track, the sites have numerous TV monitors and operators are allowed to establish admission and parking fees according to what they think the clientele will bear.

Santa Anita, which spent $1 million on air-conditioning for its off-track players, very likely will recoup that investment in this first year. And Hollywood Park, where business has sharply declined during the 1980s, at last is finding a good use for the ill-advised, $30-million pavilion that was built four years ago.

Betting on Del Mar at Santa Anita and Hollywood Park has exceeded the most optimistic projections. Officials at Santa Anita and Hollywood Park had estimated that each track would average about 4,000 people betting $800,000 a day.

“Some of us said going in that we might do $1 million a day,” said Don Robbins, the general manager at Hollywood Park. “But we tempered that to the $800,000 figure to make sure that we wouldn’t be disappointed.”

The figures for the two tracks have been almost identical--each averaging about 6,100 players and $1.4 million in daily handle. Last Sunday and Monday--the end of the Labor Day weekend--Del Mar attendance was 20,000 under the previous year’s but off-track business was heavy and more than compensated.

Said Dan Smith, a Del Mar official: “What we’re finding is that the convenience factor--being able to bet the races without traveling all the way down here from Los Angeles--comes into play more on a holiday than it would at any other time. Also, I’m sure that our on-track business was adversely affected by the 100-degree temperatures and strong winds.”

At the track this season, betting has been averaging $2.8 million a day, which is about $1 million--and 26%--below last year. Attendance, averaging 16,100, is down 19%.

But when the off-track figures are added, Del Mar is averaging $6.6 million and 33,200, respective increases of 72% and 66% when compared with last year’s track totals.

Joe Harper, Del Mar’s general manager, estimates that the track loses $18 in revenue for every fan who doesn’t come. Based on that number, the sagging attendance will cost Del Mar about $3 million by the end of the season, but the track’s share of the off-track betting will approach $5.6 million.

This year, Harper and his staff were flying blind when it came to marketing strategy. After the season began, some advertising money was shifted from the Los Angeles market to San Diego.

Next season, Del Mar should be more prepared for the double-edged planning sword. For the first time in several years, there is actually breathing room at the track on weekends, with empty seats that track management must figure out how to fill. Smith, for years Del Mar’s publicity head, is now also listed as the track’s director of marketing. It is not a hollow title.