After the stunning 20 man (and woman) Del Mar junket turnout last year, we had an impressive Possibles for 2019 board posted up on the website all summer. But, one by one, junketeers began dropping out. First it was Jimmy Bond, who was faced with a move to an assisted living facility right on junket weekend. Then came Tim A (ok, he was a 50-1 shot) followed by hard-core guys like Dave, Chuck, Bruce, Waz, Milt and Greg. All had different reasons for not making it, and when the dust had settled on junket eve we were down to a paltry 7 guys.

Heavy fog greeted the Boomer for his 5AM colored pen handicapping ritual.

This was not a complete surprise, however, as noted in last year’s recap, horse racing enthusiasm suffered a big drop off in 2018. So with little or no racing interest, its not surprising when 70+ year old junketeers don’t want to pay $210/night for sun, sand and surf that they're too old to use.

But what we ended up with was even more bizarre than all the no-shows. The 3-day weekend was really divided up into two separate junkets, I’ll call them Junket North consisting of Billy D, Roger and Mason staying at the Days Inn in Encinitas and Junket South with Joey, Junior, Commish and Boomer down at the Del Mar motel.

Boomer the Hut dined twice at Mr Tees with the rest of the Southern squad.

In the North the boys ate the offerings at the Days Inn breakfast buffet and then dinner at Mr Peabody’s Sports Bar on Encinitas Blvd while the Southerners enjoyed breakfast at Mr Tee’s and then the Soup Plantation in Del Mar Heights in the evening. We had early plans to co-mingle at one of the eateries, but for various reasons, it never worked out. At the track, the South was camped in section 12 for all 26 races, but the North wandered the plant and showed up only for a race or two on Friday and Saturday and not at all on Sunday.

TRACKSIDE With attendance of 2,562 on Friday, 8371 on Saturday and an estimated 5,000 on Sunday, it’s apparent that Del Mar has no business treating their patrons as poorly as they do. First of all parking at $10 is substantial for $2 players. Admission is ok with the Club Card at $3 but compare this to fan friendly Turf Paradise with free parking and $1 admission.

Then, once you’re out of your car in the Solana gate parking lot, they make you march all the way down to the Clubhouse entrance to get in. God forbid you need a run to your car during the day, as you cannot exit on the west end even tho they have a gate open and a guard sitting there. She explained we had to go all the way back to Clubhouse to get out AND back in

The South held a Happy Hour both nights between the races and dinner on the DMM patio.

because she wasn’t authorized a hand stamp or ink pad. This is nuts folks.

Furthermore, seating for the grandstand crowd is restricted to 2 sections on the mid-level. Further down is blocked off (so they don’t have to sweep it I guess) and closer-in is Reserved Seating for the snootier set who never seem to show up. Yep, empty all 3 days. This crams the faithful suckers, (er) fans who do show up into a horribly over crowded area. It also spawns the practice from “track know nothings” of

Outside the obvious visual component, the twenty somethings in the grandstand were a pain in the butt.

plopping their fat butts down in your seat when they stagger in with the wife and kids for the 5th while you’re busy in the chambers.

Want more? Have any of the guys running the betting feed ever been to the track as gamblers? As you’re trying to figure out your best bet on the exacta or double, they throw up the Win-Place-Show pools one at a time with the percent bet on each horse--- info NOBODY gives a s**t about.

And finally, Del Mar has a big problem with money coming in after the start. To alleviate this, they turn off the tote board (except for the mini-board in front of the club house) as they load the horses, and keep it off until the race is over. This results in your hard-fought 3-1 shot winning but paying $5.20, something that happened to both the Commish (w/ French Getaway 5-1 ML on Saturday) and Joe Cato (w/ Nomizar 6-1 ML on Sunday). Now assuming that there is no past-posting going on, can anyone explain moves like this in extremely completive races where any one of 5 horses look to have a shot? Somebody knows something not shown in the Racing Form. Makes you want to stay home with the buddies in Glendale.

Roger had a big weekend at the windows kicked off by a $10 Double on the Conformation to Aqua Seaform combo in the 2nd and 3rd race on Friday, good for $426. Then several other winners followed that.

RESULTS Even the money results showed a great disparity. In the South all 4 punters came home in the red while the North kicked ass. Billy D made a nice, little $26 profit but Roger exited with $600 stuffed into his jean pockets. This may be the biggest score on the DMJ since Junior tagged a Pick 6 using Bob Ike's handicap while sitting on the beach back in '87.

The South had no excuses either as Andy B, a cameo player in the NSAA years ago (and also my bro-in-law) had a horse, Play Money, running in Saturday’s ninth. He looked to have a big shot as the chalk and came thru in impressive fashion. Did we get well with this one? Nope, all of the Southern boys had him on their tickets, but in an effort to tag the exacta or tri, ended up tearing them all up. You can’t cure greedy or stupid.

Saturday was College Day which caused a grandstand full of 18 to 20 year olds to flood the cramped up seating in Sections 11 and 12. While Eye Candy Day was voted the best in 3 years by our consummate expert on such things, Billy D, it caused such seating confusion and insane noise during the runnings you’de think it was the Kentucky Derby out there rather than $8000 NW2 Cal-breds going 5 panels.

So where does this leave us for next year? Who knows? but I do think the junkets as we’ve known them for 40+ years are over. But what’s left is a fun package in its own right and I wouldn’t be surprised if somebody from the NSAA showed up again in 2020. And finally, did I mention that Tom Malinosky made a short cameo with Junior at the DMM on Friday to bring the official body count to eight? I thought not.