With 230 horses entered for opening day, the Eldorado Scioto Downs race office put together 16 races for Thursday, May 11.
Highlighting tonight's opening card is an eight-horse Open Trot for fillies and mares, going for $27,000. Swan Fine Lady (Chris Page) is installed as the slight 7-2 favourite coming off two wins and a second-place finish in her last three starts at Miami Valley after shipping in from Yonkers. Refined, who finished third in the 2022 Breeders Crown, will make her first start back after a three-month layoff from post eight. The seven-year-old by Uncle Peter, trained by Scioto’s 28-time leading trainer Virgil Morgan, Jr., won 11 times and earned $377,,028 in 30 starts in 2022.
The Thursday card also includes three trotting mini-series events: the Overcomer and Full Count (filly) trots for Buckeye Stallion Series-eligible horses that did not race in the first leg of the Ohio Sires Stakes, and the John Konesky Trot for fillies that have not won a pari-mutuel race. There are three full divisions each of the Overcomer and Konesky trots, going for $15,000 and $13,000, respectively. There are two divisions of seven horses going for $15,000 each in the Full Count Trots.
New for the 2023 racing season, Scioto will offer both an early and late Pick-5 wager with a 100 per cent carryover to the next day’s early or late Pick-5. The Player’s Pick-5 wager has the track’s lowest takeout at 15 per cent. The early Pick-5 starts in race three, while the late Pick-5 starts in race eight.
The typical race schedule for the 90-day Scioto Downs live racing season will be Tuesday-Saturday with first post of 3:15 p.m. on Tuesdays and Wednesdays and 5:50 p.m. first post for Thursday-Saturday cards.
(With files from Scioto Downs)