The Meadowlands Racetrack (currently referred to as Meadowlands Racing & Entertainment) is a horse racing track at the

Meadowlands Sports Complex The Meadowlands Sports Complex is a sports complex located in East Rutherford, in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. The facility is owned and operated by the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority (NJSEA). The complex currently con ...

East Rutherford East Rutherford is a borough in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the borough's population was 10,022, reflecting an increase of 1,109 (+12.4%) from the 8,913 counted in the 2010 census.

, New Jersey, United States. The track hosts both

thoroughbred racing Thoroughbred racing is a sport and industry involving the racing of Thoroughbred horses. It is governed by different national bodies. There are two forms of the sport – flat racing and jump racing, the latter known as National Hunt racing i ...

and harness racing. It is known popularly in the region as "The Big M". Meadowlands has year-round horse racing as well as a number of bars and restaurants.

History

Opened in the mid-1970s, Meadowlands Racetrack held its first-ever harness race on September 1, 1976, while thoroughbred racing commenced on September 6, 1977. With the exception of the opening season of 1976, autumn has been dedicated to the

thoroughbred The Thoroughbred is a horse breed best known for its use in horse racing. Although the word ''thoroughbred'' is sometimes used to refer to any breed of purebred horse, it technically refers only to the Thoroughbred breed. Thoroughbreds are ...

s, while the rest of the year features

standardbred The Standardbred is an American horse breed best known for its ability in harness racing, where members of the breed compete at either a trot or pace. Developed in North America, the Standardbred is recognized worldwide, and the breed can trace i ...

s, or harness horses. The advertising campaign that accompanied the start of thoroughbred racing at the Meadowlands in 1977 was noted for its use of the slogan "Racing with the Moon", originally popularized in 1941 by bandleader

Vaughn Monroe Vaughn Wilton Monroe (October 7, 1911 – May 21, 1973) was an American baritone singer, trumpeter, big band leader, actor, and businessman, who was most popular in the 1940s and 1950s. He has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for rec ...

(alluding to the fact that post-time is in the evening – a circumstance that still pertains, although afternoon programs during long holiday weekends are occasionally put on). More recent advertising campaigns have included a direct and catchy approach to attending live racing: "It's All About Being Here – The Meadowlands!" With its sweeping curves and wide stretches, the "Big M" has been known for exceptional times for harness racing. Opening night at the track featured the fastest harness mile run in

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

to that time, 1:55 by Rambling Willie. The world record for a mile by a standardbred, 1:46 by Lather Up, driven by Montrell Teague in the 2019 Graduate, matched Always B Miki's time at the Red Mile in Lexington. The Meadowlands Racetrack has been the site of the Hambletonian, the first leg of the Trotting Triple Crown, since 1981. It has also been home to the Cane Pace, the first leg of Harness Racing's Pacing Triple Crown since 2015 with the Cane run on the same program as the Hambletonian. Leading drivers in recent seasons have included Ron Pierce, Brian Sears, George Brennan, and Tim Tetrick. The track is operated by New Meadowlands Racetrack LLC with Jeff Gural as its CEO and chairman. Gural took over operations of the Meadowlands in December 2011. Ken Warkentin is the current race caller and announcer for the Meadowlands. Sam McKee was also the track announcer until he suffered a stroke days after calling what no one knew at the time would be the last card he ever would call on January 21, 2017, and passing away on March 7, 2017. Veteran sportscaster Dave Johnson, was the track's lead public-address announcer from its opening until the early 2000s. In July 2009, the

Meadowlands Rail Line The Meadowlands Rail Line, branded as the BetMGM Meadowlands Rail Line as part of a naming rights agreement, is a rail line in New Jersey, United States, operated by NJ Transit Rail Operations (NJT). Trains run between the Meadowlands Sports Com ...

opened for event service, but is expected to run daily upon completion of the nearby

American Dream Meadowlands American Dream is a retail and entertainment complex in the Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, New Jersey, United States. The first and second of four opening stages occurred on October 25, 2019, and on December 5, 2019. The remainin ...

. Bruton Smith, owner of

Lowe's Motor Speedway Charlotte Motor Speedway (previously known as Lowe's Motor Speedway from 1999 to 2009) is a motorsport complex located in Concord, North Carolina, outside Charlotte. The complex features a quad oval track that hosts NASCAR racing including ...

and other motorsports racetracks, has long had his sights on Meadowlands Racetrack for possible conversion into a short track venue for

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and ...

events in the New York City area. His most recent of several attempts to purchase the track failed in the late 1990s. A report issued in January 2010 by New Jersey Governor

Chris Christie Christopher James Christie (born September 6, 1962) is an American politician, lawyer, political commentator, lobbyist, and former federal prosecutor who served as the 55th governor of New Jersey from 2010 to 2018. Christie, who was born in N ...

discussed the idea of closing the Meadowlands Racetrack and selling it for commercial development or converting it into a NASCAR facility. Governor Christie has considered selling or leasing the racetrack to a private operator or closing it altogether. The

New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority The New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority (NJSEA) is an independent authority established by the State of New Jersey in 1971 to oversee the Meadowlands Sports Complex, but which now contains the New Jersey Meadowlands Commission, a regulatory ...

privatized the racetrack, to

Jeffrey Gural Jeffrey Gural (born July 6, 1942) is a New York real estate developer. Early life and education Gural was born to Jewish American real estate developer Aaron Gural and Harriet Feil. His mother died in 1945. His father was part owner of Newmar ...

Newmark Knight Frank Newmark Group Inc. is a commercial real estate advisory and services firm headquartered in New York City. It operates as ''Newmark'', and is listed on the NASDAQ Global Select Market under the symbol "NMRK". The company’s services include Capi ...

in December 2011. The privatization included $110 million of improvements consisting of a new 2,250-seat grandstand built on the site of the former

backstretch Backstretch refers to either: (1) the portion of an oval racetrack on the far side of the grandstand, parallel to the homestretch, or, (2) particularly in North America, the area near the racetrack where horses are stabled and the daily work of main ...

. The existing grandstand was used as an event space for

Super Bowl XLVIII Super Bowl XLVIII was an American football game between the American Football Conference (AFC) champion Denver Broncos and National Football Conference (NFC) champion Seattle Seahawks to decide the National Football League (NFL) champion for th ...

. The old Meadowlands grandstand closed for racing on November 2, 2013. The new grandstand, which cost $110 million to build and can seat 2,200, opened for racing on November 23, 2013, with an estimated crowd of 15,000 in attendance. Demolition on the old Meadowlands grandstand occurred in 2022. The Meadowlands was announced to host the championship final for the 2018 AMA Pro American Flat Track Championship motorcycle racing series, scheduled for October 6. The event, to be designated as the Meadowlands Mile, joins

Turf Paradise Turf Paradise is a thoroughbred and quarter horse racetrack located at 19th Avenue and Bell Road, in the Deer Valley section of Phoenix, Arizona in the United States. It opened in 1956. It is owned and operated by local entrepreneur Jerry Simms ...

The Red Mile The Red Mile is a horse racing track located in Lexington, Kentucky, United States. The track hosts harness racing, a type of horse racing in which the horses must pull two-wheeled carts called sulkies while racing. It is one of harness racing's m ...

Remington Park Remington Park is a horse racing track and casino located in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Built in 1988 by Edward J. DeBartolo Sr., it was the first world-class pari-mutuel track in Oklahoma. Since 2010, Global Gaming RP has owned and operated the ra ...

, and

Canterbury Park Canterbury Park () (formerly Canterbury Downs), is a horse racing track in Shakopee, Minnesota, United States. Canterbury Park Holding Corporation ("Canterbury Park") hosts parimutuel wagering on live thoroughbred and quarter horse racing at i ...

as horse racing tracks that will run the series in 2018. In June 2018,

Paddy Power Betfair Flutter Entertainment plc (formerly Paddy Power Betfair plc) is an Irish gambling holding company created by the merger of Paddy Power and Betfair, and the later acquisition of The Stars Group. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange, and is ...

announced that it had partnered with Meadowlands to open a

sportsbook In the United States, a sportsbook or a race and sports book (sometimes abbreviated as book) is a place where a gambler can wager on various sports competitions, including golf, football, basketball, baseball, ice hockey, soccer, horse racing, ...

at the track, following the state's legalization of

sports betting Sports betting is the activity of predicting sports results and placing a wager on the outcome. The frequency of sports bet upon varies by culture, with the vast majority of bets being placed on association football, American football, basket ...

(as facilitated by the result of ''

Murphy v. National Collegiate Athletic Association ''Murphy v. National Collegiate Athletic Association'', No. 16-476, 584 U.S. ___ (2018), was a United States Supreme Court case involving the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The issue was whether the U.S. federal government ha ...

''). The sportsbook opened on July 14, 2018, under the branding of

FanDuel FanDuel Group is an American gambling company that offers sportsbook, daily fantasy sports, horse racing, and online casino. The company operates sportsbooks in a number of states including New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Indiana and West Virginia, as ...

, a

daily fantasy sports Daily fantasy sports (DFS) are a subset of fantasy sport games. As with traditional fantasy sports games, players compete against others by building a team of professional athletes from a particular league or competition while remaining under a ...

service recently acquired by the company.

Physical attributes

Like many racecourses in the United States, the main (dirt) track at the Meadowlands has a circumference; inside of this is a turf course (used by the thoroughbreds only) which is . With a span of exactly from the top of the stretch to the finish line and a distance of exactly from the finish line to the beginning of the first (clubhouse) turn, the dimensions of the track are considered "typical" or "standard" for an American racetrack. The main track is wide, while the width of the turf course is . The track is equipped to race at night and most of its races are at night. In the middle of the track is a lake, intended to resemble the state of New Jersey. The old grandstand, horse barns and site, was designed by the Philadelphia architectural firm of EwingCole (now known as Ewing Cole Cherry Brott), who also designed a number of other track facilities around the world as well as

Citizens Bank Park Citizens Bank Park is a baseball stadium located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the city's South Philadelphia Sports Complex. It is the home playing field of the Philadelphia Phillies, the city's Major League Baseball (MLB) franchise. The ...

in Philadelphia (with Populous). The new grandstand opened for simulcasting on Monday, November 18, 2013. The official unveiling of the new grandstand was on November 23, 2013, for first night of live fall harness racing. The collaborative production by managing partner Jeff Gural and The Hard Rock spans 180,000 square feet across four floors and includes a track apron that holds up to 10,000 people. Notable drivers in attendance included John Campbell, Yannick Gingras, Scott Zeron and Tim Tetrick. Famed pacer Gallo Blue Chip kicked off the racing action with a ribbon cutting ceremony across the finish line.

Accessibility and transportation

Like the rest of the sports complex, Meadowlands Racetrack is accessible via Exit 16W on the western spur of the New Jersey Turnpike (

I-95 Interstate 95 (I-95) is the main north–south Interstate Highway on the East Coast of the United States, running from US Route 1 (US 1) in Miami, Florida, to the Houlton–Woodstock Border Crossing between Maine and the Canadia ...

) which is located adjacent to NJ Route 3 and NJ Route 120.

NJ Transit New Jersey Transit Corporation, branded as NJ Transit, and often shortened to NJT, is a state-owned public transportation system that serves the U.S. state of New Jersey, along with portions of New York State and Pennsylvania. It operates bu ...

provides bus service on the 160 from the

Port Authority Bus Terminal The Port Authority Bus Terminal (colloquially known as the Port Authority and by its acronym PABT) is a bus terminal located in Manhattan in New York City. It is the busiest bus terminal in the world by volume of traffic, serving about 8,000 buse ...

and the 703 on the Haledon/Paterson/East Rutherford route. NJ Transit also provides rail service on the

at the

Meadowlands station Meadowlands Sports Complex, or Meadowlands, is a New Jersey Transit train station that is the western terminus for the Meadowlands Rail Line located at the Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, New Jersey. The station is situated equid ...

Racing

Up until the 1990s, The Meadowlands held these thoroughbred stakes races, some of which were moved to Monmouth Park: * Grade III – Meadowlands Cup * Grade III –

Cliff Hanger Stakes The Cliff Hanger Stakes is an American Thoroughbred horse race run annually at Monmouth Park in East Rutherford, New Jersey during late September/early October. Open to horses age three and older, it is now contested on turf over a distance of mi ...

* Grade III –

Pegasus Stakes The Pegasus Stakes is a Listed American Thoroughbred horse race run annually in June at Monmouth Park Racetrack in Oceanport, New Jersey. An event for three-year-olds of either gender, it is contested at a mile and an sixteenth (eight and a half ...

* Grade III – Violet Handicap * former Grade III –

Morven Stakes The Morven Stakes was an American Thoroughbred horse race run between 1978 and 2001 at Meadowlands Racetrack in East Rutherford, New Jersey. A race on turf for two-year-old horses or either sex, it was last run over a distance of five furlongs (5 ...

From November until the first Saturday of August, in addition to the Hambletonian and

Meadowlands Pace The Meadowlands Pace is a harness race for three-year-old pacers, held at the Meadowlands Racetrack, in East Rutherford, New Jersey, East Rutherford, Bergen County, New Jersey, Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. It is the richest pacing rac ...

, the Meadowlands Racetrack also hosts a variety of other stakes races for standardbreds: * Super Bowl (discontinued) * Escort (discontinued) * Worldly Beauty (discontinued) * Charles Singer Memorial (discontinued) * Burning Point (discontinued) * Sonsam (discontinued) * William "Buddy" Gilmour (discontinued) * Shiaway St. Pat (discontinued) * Clyde Hirt Stakes (discontinued) * Reynolds Series * Simpson Series * Giant Victory (discontinued) * Artistic Vision (discontinued) * Whata Baron (discontinued) * New Jersey Sire Series * Graduate Pace & Trot * Miss Versatility * Golden Girls * Del Miller Memorial Trot * Mistletoe Shalee * Stanley Dancer Memorial * William R. Haughton Memorial * Miss New Jersey * New Jersey Classic * Ima Lula (discontinued) * Duenna * Townsend Ackerman * Shady Daisy * Fresh Yankee * Lady Liberty * U.S. Pacing Championship * John Cashman Jr. Memorial * Jim Doherty Memorial (formerly known as Merrie Annabelle) * Peter Haughton Memorial *

Cane Pace The Cane Pace is a harness horse race for standardbred pacers run annually since 1955. The race was first run as the William H. Cane Futurity in 1955 at Yonkers Raceway in New York. In 1956 the race joined with the Little Brown Jug and the Messe ...

* Hambletonian Oaks * Continental Victory (discontinued) * TVG Free For All Series * Tarpot Hap * The Three Diamonds * The Goldsmith Maid * The Valley Victory * The Governor's Cup

References

External links