HORSE RACING LOS ALAMITOS : Hollywood Park Meeting Proposed

Los Alamitos officials have proposed 1992 racing dates that would shorten the current quarter horse meeting but provide quarter horse racing at Hollywood Park for the first time since 1987.

The proposal was presented Monday to a California Horse Racing Board Committee. It asks for 32 weeks of quarter horse racing, 43 weeks of harness racing and three weeks of thoroughbred and quarter horse fair racing.

Under the plan, quarter horse racing would end at Los Alamitos on Jan. 18 instead of Feb. 8. Quarter horses would resume at Los Alamitos for a 13-week meeting from April 28 to July 25, shift to Hollywood Park for 10 weeks from Aug. 21 to Oct. 31 and resume at Los Alamitos on Nov. 16 until Jan. 16, 1993.

The 1992 harness season would begin Jan. 21 with a 14-week meeting at Los Alamitos, then move north to Cal-Expo at Sacramento for a 16-week meeting from May 2 to Aug. 14, and resume at Los Alamitos Aug. 17 to Nov. 14.

The Orange County Racing Fair--which this year conducted a thoroughbred, quarter horse and Arabian racing meeting--would have a three-week meeting from July 27 to Aug. 15.

Jim Smith, executive vice president and chief operating officer of the Horsemen’s Quarter Horse Racing Assn., said the committee indicated it will consider the proposal at its Oct. 25 meeting in Monrovia.

The proposed harness schedule gives the sport exposure it lacked this season. The only meeting this year in California was a meeting that lasted from February through late July at Los Alamitos. Harness horses also raced at Sacramento last year.

The quarter horse meeting at Hollywood Park would replace the Bay Meadows meeting, which was held from mid-May to mid-July.

“The only opposition (to the proposal) was Oak Tree (which runs a thoroughbred meeting in October and November at Santa Anita), which doesn’t want us racing at night when they’re racing during the day,” Smith said. “Harness, quarter horse and Orange County Fair (officials) were in agreement.”

Seven months after sending Griswold to a world-record performance at Los Alamitos, trainer Dan Francisco is leaving quarter horse racing.

The 48-year-old Huntington Beach resident has dispersed his small stable and is beginning a career as an electrical contractor. He cited the rising cost of operating a public stable as his main reason for leaving the sport after 21 years.

Francisco, who had 20 horses when the Bay Meadows meeting began last May, had only seven last week.

“It has been eating at me quite a while,” he said. “The stables are getting too big. (It used to be) if I could hold 10 head together I could make a living. Now, you need 20--labor, feed, everything has gone sky high.”

Griswold, a 5-year-old gelding, set the world record for 870 yards twice in the last nine months .

Griswold set a world record of 44.07 seconds in his first 870-yard race, in December. After a stakes victory in January, he won the Bull Rastus Invitational on Feb. 1 in 43.99.

Griswold then lost his next three races but Francisco, who through Sept. 10 had won four of 53 starts, said other factors, not Griswold’s losing performances, led to his decision.

“That didn’t have anything to do with it,” he said. “In another race or two, he’ll come back, but I can’t base my livelihood on one horse.”

Corona Chick’s impressive trial victory last Wednesday gave the 2-year-old filly the fastest qualifying time for Saturday’s Ed Burke Memorial Futurity and might even make her the favorite, despite the presence of All-American Futurity runner-up Ed Grimley.

Corona Chick, who won last month’s Governor’s Cup Futurity at Los Alamitos, is owned by Robert Etchandy of Anaheim Hills and is trained by Frank Monteleone. Kip Didericksen was aboard the filly, but he also qualified Ed Grimley and Holland Ease. He has yet to announce which he will ride. The draw for the race will be held today.

The 350-yard $295,000 futurity is one of the most lucrative races at Los Alamitos and this year has drawn a strong field. Other qualifiers include Dashing Cleat, a gray who was second in futurities in Wyoming and Utah; Reign Of Terror, third behind Ed Grimley in the Bay Meadows Futurity; Holland Ease, sixth in the All-American; Rush Fora Firstdown, the California Sires Cup Futurity winner, and Hes A Dazzlin Dasher, who was second in that race.

Three of the qualifiers--among them Corona Chick who qualified in 17.50 seconds--were sired by Chicks Beduino, and five were sired by First Down Dash. Holland Ease, Rush Fora Firstdown and Ed Grimley are trained by Bob Baffert.

Corona Chick has won five of seven races.