Good Evening!
Welcome to a new post here at zoelouisesmithx.com! Today’s is a very interesting story I wanted to share, it may not be a long post but it’s one I wanted to share so let’s just jump straight into it.
In 2006, extreme ‘daredevil’ sports were all the rage in America. Thousands of people were watching sports where lives were at risk, so the management at Calder Racecoure in Miami Gardens decided they wanted to be a part of the action. So in July 2006, they announced their first ever ‘extreme day’ at the races, promising that this day at the races would be like nothing anyone had ever seen before. Long races, short races, backwards races, foot races – you name it, they included it. They were set at bending every rule they could. The Calder President Ken Dunn told the American press at the time:
We may get some people in the industry laughing at us, thinking it’s silly. But it has generated talk and that’s good.”
When the day arrived, the only extreme event taking place was the weather. The rain had made conditions on the track unsafe as well as keeping fans away, which was their whole point of the event. So they decided to try again later in the year, so they rescheduled their promotion to the 25th of November 2006.
The event included:
The Fast N Furious Stakes – Two furlongs on dirt
The Methusela Starter Stakes – For 5 year olds and older
King George’s Wrong Way Starter Stakes – 1 & 1/4 miles on turf going the opposite direction
The Gray Pride Stakes – Starter stakes restricted to horses that were gray or roan in colour (worth $45,000)
The World’s Fastest Daily Double – Two races run simultaneously on the dirt and turf courses
A 70 yard foot race between jockeys
The day didn’t quite go as planned with only 7,000 people showing up to the event and challenges along the way including jockeys protesting that the King George should be ran on the turf, not the dirt like initially planned.
But the highlight of the entire day was the World’s Fastest Daily Double. One was ran on the turf and another on the dirt, finishing just 36 seconds apart. The hardest job being left to the announcer Bobby Neuman who was given the task of calling both races at the same time. Later telling American press:
I just went back and forth as much as I could. I wanted to have fun with it and be as confusing as possible. I didn’t want to focus on one race more than the other.”
To this day, the record has never been beaten and I highly doubt it ever will. However everybody was talking about the event which meant Calder continued the event in 2007, however cancelling it in 2008 as it didn’t attract any many people as they thought it might, it only gained them more national media attention.
Overall, I thought this was a crazy story and had to share it. I hope you all enjoyed and I’ll see you Saturday for my next post at 11am.
zoelouisesmithx 