view raw text
HIGH RACING VALUES IN BUENOS AIRES Purses for Ordinary Events 1325 and Over Enormous Mutuel Takings Of racing at the great Palermo course on the out ¬ skirts of Buenos Aires Argentine Republic a cor ¬ respondent of the Manchester England Sporting Chronicle writes writesHow How presentday racing stakes and liabilities of owners running their horses at Palermo the fine race course on the outskirts of Buenos Aires com ¬ pare with those of the preparimutuel days I can ¬ not say but they are framed on so liberal a scale that the influence of the funds derived from the machine is manifest The entrance fee for all or ¬ dinary races is one per cent of the value of the prize to the winner In the more important races it is only onehalf of one per cent A days pro ¬ gram invariably consists of eight races none of which is worth less than 1325 to the winner On days when there is no important event the average value of the races to the winner is aboiit 2100 The second horse receives a sum equal to onetenth of the winners share and the third saves his stake I am told by a friend who has done a lot of racing at Palermo that the charge for admission to the grandstand and paddock is 250 All the appoint ¬ ments are of a most luxurious character characterTen Ten per cent is deducted from the parimutuel pool The government receives a clear five per cent The Jockey Club gets what remains of the other five per cent after expenses incurred in work ¬ ing the machine have been paid The money re ¬ ceived by the government is distributed between the City of Buenos Aires hospitals and the board of education This ten per cent deducted in 1917 pro ¬ duced the sum of 2625000 2625000I I base this calculation oh a statement in the report of the Jockey Club that 1314190 had been placed in the national bank to the order of the commissioners of race courses and I take that to be the proceeds of the five per cent to which the government was entitled If after paying the expenses entailed in working the parimutuel the Jockey Clubs share amounted to three per cent they would get 785000 The revenue from the meetings apart from gentry fees for horses sub ¬ scriptions etc was 3189750 and that includes the parimutuel receipts This total shows the gigantic scale on which the racing at Palermo is planned and enables us to entertain conjecture of the success which would attend a similar venture on the outskirts of London
