by the Hambletonian Society

¨ $37 million in total purse money has been paid in 81 editions. The total purse in 2007 will be $1.7 million, making it the richest harness race in the world.

¨ A crowd of 29,531 adults plus an estimated 3,500 children came out to watch the 2006 Hambletonian.

¨ Hambletonian Day 2006 produced a total of $8,096,924 in wagering, the highest handle in the sport of harness racing.

¨ The Meadowlands Racetrack’s live, seven-hour broadcast on Hambletonian Day is viewed at more than 600 wagering outlets across North America and Europe. International simulcast recipients of the Hambletonian have included France, Italy, and Scandinavia.

¨ The Hambletonian, hosted by the Meadowlands since 1981, has been broadcast on national television for 32 consecutive years (1975-2007). An average of more than 1 million television households nationwide watched the Hambletonian on CBS over the past six years.

¨ This year the race returns to NBC after 13 years on CBS, marking the longest running consecutive national television exposure for harness racing’s most important event.

¨ Additional media outlets on Hambletonian day include TVG, which is available on Dish, DirecTV and Cablevision in over 55 million homes. Additional coverage airs on Fox Sportsnet, WFAN-Sports radio and Sirius Satellite Radio.

¨ More than 250 press credentials are issued annually for Hambletonian. More than 50 reporters from nine foreign countries covered last year’s edition. Reporters from Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Germany, New Zealand, Norway and Sweden flew in for the special event.

¨ The 2006 Hambletonian/Haskell weekend featured back-to-back $1 million races at the New Jersey Sports and Exposition’s tracks: the $1.7 million Hambletonian for trotters at the Meadowlands and the $1 million Haskell for thoroughbreds at Monmouth Park. The combined Hambletonian and Haskell attendance was 70,000 people, with combined wagering of $20 million.

¨ The Hambletonian is the first leg in the trotting Triple Crown, which encompasses two races in excess of $1 million, the Hambletonian (Aug. 4), the Yonkers Trot (Aug. 18) in Yonkers, NY and concludes with the Kentucky Futurity (Oct. 6) at Lexington’s Red Mile.

¨ Since 1981, Hambletonian charity events have raised nearly $1 million for Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, the Standardbred Retirement Foundation and the Harness Racing Museum and Hall of Fame, as well as bring in thousands of pounds of food for the NJ Foodbank.

¨ One of the “World’s Top Ten” horseracing events and destinations.

HISTORY OF THE HAMBLETONIAN

The Hambletonian is worth far more than the $1.5 million prize it offers. A Hambletonian victory is an elusive dream for most, and the cherished memory of a lifetime for those who win it. Since the Roaring Twenties, the Hambletonian has been the most coveted title in the sport; the race that a horse owner or trainer dares to dream about. Worth millions in money, but priceless in memory, winning the Hambletonian means that among the thousands of horses born each year, the winning horse is inarguably the best in the race that counts most.

In the booming good times after World War I, entrepreneur and harness racing enthusiast Harry Reno dreamed of a trotting race that would be the richest, most renowned in the world. Together with publisher John Bauer and racing writers John Markey and John Hervey, Reno created the Hambletonian, the world’s richest race for three-year-old trotters, a status it maintains today.

The race was named for the stallion whose blood flows through nearly every horse racing. Hambletonian was foaled in Orange County, New York on May 5, 1849. Bred by Jonas Seely Jr., he was sold along with his mother for $125 to Seely’s hired man, William Rysdyk. He never raced, but took a time trial mark of 2:48 1/2 as a three-year-old. As a sire he achieved immortality. He sired 1,331 foals, collecting a stud fee of $500 his last nine seasons, equal to $10,000 in current dollars.

Hambletonian passed on his strength and courage through his progeny and today his name symbolizes the best of the sport throughout the trotting world. So predominant were his bloodlines that even today, every horse racing in North America can trace their pedigree back to Hambletonian.

Since its inception, interest in the Hambletonian was strong and swift. Three tracks (Atlanta, GA, Kalamazoo, MI, and Syracuse, NY) submitted bids for the inaugural running of the Hambletonian Stake in August 1926. The race was awarded to the New York State Fair at Syracuse. Eager buyers snapped up most of the three-year-old trotters on the market. More than 600 horses were nominated to the inaugural race which was conducted some 50 years following the death of Hambletonian. Eight trotters contested a purse of $73,451, a staggering sum for the day. The purse grew steadily over the years and has been worth at least a million dollars since 1983, its third year at the Meadowlands. In 2007 it will be worth $1.5 million, again setting a precedent in harness racing.

For the first four years the location of the event alternated between Syracuse and Lexington, Kentucky. It then settled in at Good Time Park in Goshen, New York where it was raced from 1930 through 1956 except for one war-year appearance at New York’s Empire City Track, now known as Yonkers Raceway. It later moved to the DuQuoin State Fairgrounds in DuQuoin, Illinois, where it was ceremoniously hosted by the W. R. Hayes Family from 1957 to 1980 before moving to the Meadowlands, the world’s most prestigious harness track in 1981. The Meadowlands is now the longest home track the race has known, as this year’s event will be the 27th raced over the mile oval. The current contract between the Meadowlands and the Hambletonian Society extends through 2009.

The Hambletonian has disbursed $37 million in total purse money throughout the 82-year history. Showcased by the Meadowlands and the Hambletonian Society with a week-long festival that includes a charity golf tournament, a parade through the town of Rutherford, press conferences, horse sales and wine tastings, amateur races and celebrity events, picnic and rides in paddock park and the gaudiest stakes calendar the sport has ever known, the final day of the Meadowlands meet culminates with the Hambletonian.

The day has continued to set records – in 2005 Hambletonian day at the Meadowlands produced a total of $9 million in wagering, a record handle. The Hambletonian, broadcast by CBS for 13 years begins a new contract with NBC in 2007, making it the only harness race to claim 32 consecutive years of national television exposure. In addition, the Meadowlands live, seven-hour broadcast on Hambletonian Day is viewed at more than 600 wagering outlets across North America and Europe and by a crowd in excess of 25,000 annually.

But the Hambletonian is so much more than facts and figures. From Guy McKinney (1926) to Glidemaster (2006) winning the Hambletonian has stamped the victor with immortality, and established a place in history for all involved with the trotter who remains straight, swift and true to the Hambletonian finish line.