Thursday Thoughts with Jason Beem for Dec. 4, 2025

Jason discusses Turfway Park opening and shares some stories from his early visits to the Florence, Kentucky track. 

A good Thursday morning to you all! I hope everyone who was playing Turfway Park last night had some luck. I really think there’s few things more cool than watching racing where the snow is on the infield and outside of the track, it’s just so visually pleasing. I got to watch the first part of the card and the races were pretty formful. I think sometimes Turfway gets maligned as a total oddball track, but I think that’s just the result of full fields and competitive races as much as anything else. Plus you often get horses trying that surface for a first time or coming back to it. 

I haven’t had the chance to visit the “new” Turfway Park since its remodel a few years ago. But I got to spend many a night at the old Turfway and like most race tracks, it had its charms. I weirdly remember discovering Turfway back in the early to mid 2000s when Emerald Downs would simulcast the races from there on Friday evenings along with Hoosier Park, back when they ran Thoroughbreds. Turfway had this bright green simulcast signal background color and you couldn’t miss it. Similar to today, there were big fields and often very interesting racing. This was right before the move to synthetic, but something drew me to the place.

My first visit to Turfway was in 2006 before starting my first announcing assignment at River Downs. I went upstairs and introduced myself to a couple of people who worked in the placing judges stand and turns out they also worked at River. Then I met Arnie and Jack in the Equibase office and they were nice enough to let me hang out between races with them and they’d tell me all sorts of stories and give me advice about River. Jack had this great white mustache that each night I’d go to Turfway would become stained orange by the pasta sauce he ate with his dinner. He also referred to every track by ending it with a Y. Gulfy, Tampy, Turfy, that’s what he called all the other tracks. Just great racetrack characters. 

That spring I sat up there for a week before River started, practicing calling the races at Turfway, terrified of when it would be my turn with the actual microphone on. I got to meet and visit with Mike Battaglia and watch him call a couple of races and he couldn’t have been nicer. My favorite memories of Mike were how he’d be downstairs on a Saturday, with like a minute to post at Turfway Park, betting on Santa Anita’s first race. Then he’d hustle back up to the booth and call the race like it was no big deal. The next year, 2007, I was visiting with Mike and asked him who he liked in the Kentucky Derby (G1). He said “I love Street Sense, but I think Hard Spun will run well too.”  They of course ran one-two. Nice picks! 

There was a definite divide between the Turfway crowd and the River Downs crowd, even though they were only maybe 10 or 15 miles apart. The Kentucky folks very much thought of Turfway as their place and while of course some would come to River in the summers, it really was quite provincial there amongst racing fans. I feel like I have four or five other Turfway stories I want to tell, but maybe we’ll save those for another column. One of my favorite stories is the story of “Bill Melton’s Walt’s Hitching Post.” It involves a restaurant, a horse owner, a poker game, and good ribs.  

It’s been cool to see Turfway have a bit of a moment these last few years and hopefully it’s one that can continue to be a strong evening signal during the chilly winter months. Good luck to everyone who plays!