Live racing resumes at beautiful Belmont Park on Thursday, September 16th. First race Post Time is 2:05 for the Twilight racing card.

For more than a century, Belmont as been the stage for many of racing’s greatest legends, from CURLIN to RACHEL ALEXANDRA, and SEABISQUIT to CIGAR to name a few.

Significant increases to purses were made for the Belmont Spring and Summer meets across most race categories and NYRA announced that their horsemen will continue to compete for some of the highest purses in North America.

New York-bred Maiden Special Weight races will offer a purse of $75,000 dollars, while horses bred in the Empire State will benefit from an $80,000 purse for the non-Winners of one category and an $85,000 purse for non-Winners of two/$45,000 claimers.

The Fall meet, which will run from Thursday, September 16 through Sunday, October 31st will also offer four Grade 1 races and five Win and You’re In qualifiers to the Breeders’ Cup in November at Del Mar.

The 28-day meet features live racing Thursday through Sunday, and includes 20 Graded Stakes among 47 total Stakes worth $11.15 million dollars in purses.

The highlight of this Belmont meet will be the return of the Grade 1 Woodward Stakes on October 2nd. The Woodward has been run at Saratoga since 2006, but was previously held at Belmont Park and now makes it’s return to the Elmont track this year.

The first two Stakes will come on Friday, with a pair of $100,000 six-furlong turf sprints with the Allied Forces for sophomores and the Christiecat for 3-year-old fillies.

Saturday will feature the meets first Breeders’ Cup qualifier with the $1 million Jockey Club Derby for 3-year-olds going 1 1/2 miles on the turf.

Also on Saturday is the $700,000 Jockey Club Oaks, the concluding leg of the Turf Triple for 3-year-old fillies, held at 1 3/8 miles.

The card is bolstered by the 1 5/8-mile $300,000 Grand Prix American Jockey Club Invitational. 

Welcome back New York racing !