The last time Jeff Gural was on Trot Radio, he said with conviction that "it was a mathematical certainty" that harness racing was "going to die". Why would Gural try to revive and invest in the Meadowlands?

"First of all I think everyone agrees that losing the Meadowlands would really be a major blow to the sport," Gural told Trot Radio's Norm Borg. "So in my mind when I said it's going to die, I kind of said it will die in 10, 15 years...I think if the Meadowlands closes, [harness racing] could die pretty quickly."

Gural and Borg also discuss the recent press release in which Gural challenged horsemens' groups in slot-enhanced jurisdictions to put aside five per cent of their purse pool for marketing purposes.

"Hopefully it's a wake up call for the industry...to me that's a no-brainer. Horsemen have the attitude "it's not our responsibility, it's the racetrack owner's". You have a chicken and egg. That's great, but you know the racetrack owner's not going to do it because, frankly, it's better off using that money to market the slots and if he does, he's helping you because you're getting a percentage of the slots revenue. So the truth of the matter is, to a certain extent, the perfect world would be that the racetrack owner spends as much money as he can marketing the slots and the horsemen use their small percentage of the slots money to market the sport."

The full interview with Gural is available below. Please note that the opinions expressed in the following interview are those of the participant and do not necessarily reflect Rideau Carleton Raceway and/or Standardbred Canada.

Episode 184 – Jeff Gural

Audio Format: MP3 audio

Host: Norm Borg