Santa Anita Races Canceled by Rain

Virtually 10 years to the day of another postponement, Santa Anita was forced to call off its races Sunday because unrelenting rain made the racing surface unsafe.

About 30 minutes after the first race, after a meeting between management and riders in the jockeys’ room, the last eight races on the card were postponed. Two $100,000 races -- the San Miguel and Santa Ysabel Stakes -- will be rescheduled.

Los Alamitos, which lost the last race of its quarter horse card when the jockeys declined to ride Saturday night, canceled its Sunday-night program because of the track’s condition.

The first race, which was run over a track called sloppy, was marred when Carano, a 4-year-old gelding making his first start, went down near the quarter pole. The horse fell on his jockey, Mike Smith, who suffered minor injuries. Carano, a son of In Excess and a full brother to the stakes-winning Valentine Dancer, was euthanized.

In the jockeys’ room after the race, Smith complained of soreness in his neck and upper back.

“I thank the Lord it wasn’t any worse,” the Hall of Fame jockey said. “The horse just slipped. I thought we were going to win the way he was going. It was a good meeting we had with management, but there’ll always be another day. Steve Wood [track superintendent] has done a great job, but the track was just too slick.”

Under similar rainy circumstances, Santa Anita postponed the rest of the card on another Sunday -- Jan. 8, 1995 -- after the first race had been run. That year, the next two racing days, Jan. 11 and 12, were rained out.

More than 16 inches of rain has hit Santa Anita since the meet opened Dec. 26. Counting Sunday, there have been off-tracks 10 consecutive days. During an 84-day meet in 2003-04, there were only five off-tracks.

“We had three inches of rain since last night,” Wood said Sunday morning. “Average for the entire [season] is 14 inches.”

There already had been 11 scratches Sunday as the rain continued to fall. One of the declared horses, in the Santa Ysabel Stakes, was Sweet Catomine, who would have been an odds-on favorite had she run for the first time since winning the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies on Oct. 30.

About 3,000 fans were on hand when the postponement was announced, said George Haines, track general manager.

“It was the best thing to do,” Haines said. “It was in the best interests of everybody. The riders said that the horses were not getting the necessary foothold. We didn’t want to expose the horses and jockeys to any unnecessary risks.”

Rain checks, which include a free program, were issued to the fans. Santa Anita is dark today and Tuesday.

“It looks like we may finally get a break in the weather,” Haines said. “The plan is to race on Wednesday. It’s amazing the track is as good as it is, considering all the rain.”