Cal Expo is pointless without horse racing

By R.E. Graswich
July 2025

Forget funnel cake. For me, the State Fair means horse racing. After losing my bets, I visit the barns where kids in white uniforms pamper hogs, sheep and goats. Then home.

Now there’s no horse racing. And apologies, but once you’ve seen 1,000 hogs tended by intense, apple-cheeked teenagers, there’s no need for 1,001.

Which leaves zero reasons to attend the State Fair.

Don’t blame the State Fair. Cal Expo is collateral damage, trapped in a mess of economic pressure, incompetence and indifference.

Economic pressure starts with the Stronach Group, a gambling and real estate company that ran Golden Gate Fields in Albany. Stronach closed Golden Gate Fields last year to enhance the company’s Southern California racetrack, Santa Anita.

Pressure also comes from tribal casinos. They lobby the governor, Legislature and voters to prohibit slot machines at California tracks.

Other states support horse racing with trackside slots. But local tribes hate gambling with competition. They cheer the death of horse racing.

Incompetence was plain in thoroughbred owners and organizers who tried to replace Golden Gate Fields last fall with Alameda County’s dilapidated track at Pleasanton. They ran a three-month meet, lost $135,000 per week, and gave up.

Indifference comes from sports fans who forgot about horse racing. I’ve seen 8,000 people crowd Cal Expo’s grandstand for State Fair races. That was long ago.

In recent years, racetracks at Stockton, Vallejo, San Mateo, Pomona and Inglewood closed. Cross off Golden Gate Fields, Pleasanton, Ferndale and Fresno. Cal Expo is the final casualty, canceling summer thoroughbred and winter harness racing.

Once a powerhouse industry that supported thousands of jobs and generated millions of dollars, horse racing is down to three tracks in California. The nearest to Sacramento is 395 miles away.

The fair circuit, a caravan that paraded racehorses around Northern California for two-week stopovers June to October, is gone.

Now Sacramento sports fans have one less event to savor and celebrate. The State Fair has one less reason to exist.

Cal Expo downplayed the fair circuit’s demise. Officials made the final breath sound inevitable, an outcome caused by lackadaisical breeding and poor herd management.

Cal Expo CEO Tom Martinez says, “We have explored every possible avenue, but with a heavy heart, we’ve come to the unfortunate decision that it is simply not feasible to continue with racing this season.”

He explains, “There are simply no horses available to keep this tradition alive.”

Martinez tells the truth, mathematically speaking.

When Golden Gate Fields closed and Pleasanton failed, 600 horses who work the fair circuit stepped onto vans and moved to Santa Anita in Arcadia, Los Alamitos in Orange County, barns near San Diego and a racetrack in Washington.

They scattered like wild mustangs.

There were warnings. The pandemic shut Cal Expo for two years, 2020-21. The State Fair canceled several races in 2023 when high temperatures made conditions dangerous. Last year, the fair dropped a few races because there weren’t enough horses.

Cal Expo management hopes to drive past the wreckage of a 151-year Sacramento tradition and pretend there’s nothing to see. Horse racing is dead. The State Fair struggles on. But why bother?

The State Fair opens July 11. Guests can enjoy a candy maze selfie exhibit and music from Air Supply. They can sample blue-ribbon wines.

But they can’t watch a horse race and put a $2 bet on In Without Knockin, a 4-year-old filly who finished first and second in two Northern California races last year. In Without Knockin hopped a van to Santa Anita.
Cal Expo gave up on horse racing. Now Sacramento will learn if the State Fair can survive without its original centerpiece.

The racetrack consumes half the fair’s real estate. Maybe condos will replace the grandstand, track and barns. Meantime, Cal Expo crumbles into irrelevance.

Without horse racing, the State Fair isn’t the State Fair. It’s a carnival with corn dogs and goats.

R.E. Graswich can be reached at regraswich@icloud.com. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram: @insidesacramento.