Leamington Raceway breaks a record for the second straight week

For the second week in a row, Leamington Raceway has broken a record. More than $81,000 worth of bets were placed Sunday afternoon breaking last week’s opening season track record of close to $73,000.

"It’s great. People love to come out and relax," said Tom Bain, board member of the Lakeshore Horse Racing Association.

The racing season opened last week with over a thousand people in attendance. Sunday saw the same flurry of horse racing enthusiasts.

The momentum is being felt on the grounds of the raceway where staff and horsemen have new amenities that were a long-time coming. Something as simple as a washroom in the paddock has saved many a long walk to the old facility. The track has a new electronic starter and a new start car. Right next to the paddock is a new $250,000 state-of-the-art horse testing building replacing an old dilapidated barn.

The new additions and family atmosphere shows the growth of the track and attracting racers and fans from across Ontario.

"We're drawing horses in from the Toronto area and when we have our series that we run our stake series we draw them in from all Ontario now. So your caliber of horses has become much better, some real fine horse racing here."