Thayer to be Keynote Speaker at NHBPA Conference

Damon Thayer, who served as one of horse racing’s foremost champions during his 22-year tenure in the Kentucky General Assembly, will be the keynote speaker at the National HBPA Conference Feb. 25-27 in in Safety Harbor, Fla.

Thayer will address the conference Tuesday, Feb. 25 at the Safety Harbor Resort and Spa in the Tampa, Fla. area.

Eric Hamelback, CEO of the National Horsemen’s Benevolent & Protective Association, said he strives for keynote speakers who bring in a topical but also uplifting message.

“Former Senator Thayer fits the bill perfectly, including his increasing ownership interest in racehorses through the C.J. Thoroughbreds partnership,” Hamelback said. “Damon has spent his entire adult life in horse racing in some capacity, including in publicity, marketing, track and event management, and with his consulting company, as well as the past 22 years as a citizen legislator.

“Few people are as well-positioned to speak to horse racing’s complex problems and, while admittedly difficult, solutions. Damon painfully experienced Kentucky racing on the ropes not that long ago. He was instrumental in protecting historical horse racing (HHR) to restore that racing circuit to relevancy and much more. We look forward to hearing how Kentucky could be a road map for other states to establish HHR’s legitimacy as a pari-mutuel wagering product that allows our labor-intensive industry to thrive while creating jobs and sparking economic development. But besides knowing how state legislatures make sausage, Damon knows the unabashed joy from winning a claiming race to having a horse run in the Breeders’ Cup.”

Thayer said he’s honored to be invited to deliver the keynote address.

“I look forward to sharing some success stories from Kentucky’s legislative wins on behalf of the horse industry and talking about the things I have in common with horsemen across the country,” Thayer said. “I understand people don’t want to just hear how great Kentucky racing has become; they want to know how to replicate some of that in their own state. So I’ll talk about lessons learned and what I think are strategies that could translate to other racing jurisdictions, not just legislatively but drawing on a lifelong passion for racing and almost 40 years in various marketing and management posts in the industry and certainly now with my horse ownership.”

Thayer grew up a horse-crazy kid in northern Michigan far from any racetrack. His passion was steered toward racing after his dad, at a 4-H leadership meeting, met a guy who bred and owned racehorses. Through such happenstance and making his own luck during and after graduation from Michigan State University, Thayer worked his way from positions with increasing responsibilities at Detroit Race Course, Thistledown, Maryland Jockey Club and Turfway Park. Thayer joined the Breeders’ Cup in 1999 as vice president/event management. In 2003 he successfully ran for the Kentucky State Senate, spending his last 13 years in office as the Senate Majority Floor Leader. He left the Breeders’ Cup in 2007 to launch Thayer Communications and Consulting.

In the Kentucky Senate, Thayer spear-headed support for the law passed in 2021 to protect HHR gaming. He was instrumental in the 2022 legislation that standardized the excise tax on every pari-mutuel wager placed in Kentucky, allowed Kentucky Thoroughbred Development Fund money to be added to the purses for claiming races and reduced the “breakage” so bet payouts are rounded down to the nearest penny.

Thayer in 2004 pushed through creation of the breeders’ incentive funds financed through the 6-percent sales tax on stud fees. He was appointed by both Republican and Democratic governors to the Equine Drug Research Council, which recommends equine medication regulation and testing policies to the racing commission. Thayer also was a vital player in Kentucky’s years-long effort to get sports betting in the state, requiring the companies creating the odds and handling the bets to partner with one or more racetracks in the state. For all that and more, he was honored in November with the Louisville-based Kentucky Thoroughbred Owners’ Warner L. Jones Jr. Horseman of the Year Award.

The HBPA Conference features a full-day of panel discussions and presentations on Tuesday, Feb. 25 and a half-day on Wednesday, Feb. 26, after which an afternoon at Tampa Bay Downs is scheduled, courtesy of the racetrack. The full National HBPA board will meet Thursday morning, overseen by National HBPA President Doug Daniels.

In addition to Thayer’s keynote address, the Feb. 25 awards luncheon includes honoring Spikezone, off an 11-for-14 season, as the National HBPA’s Claiming Horse of the Year.

Among other panels

The conference kicks off with a discussion entitled “HISA, HIWU and RHSA—Now and the Future”—a fluid topic with the National HBPA and others’ challenges to the constitutionality the Horseracing Integrity & Safety Act and the HISA corporation it created quite possibly being heard by the Supreme Court this year. Panelists include Jay Ingle and Chris Hoskins, members of the Lexington-based Jackson Kelly law firm that specializes in equine law and which worked with the National HBPA on a horsemen’s toolkit to aid racing participants in complying with HISA and the Horseracing Integrity & Welfare Unit (HIWU), as well as tips for trainers faced with a notice of violation. They will be joined by Amanda Kelsey, a member of the Ingram Group, the National HBPA’s political consultant and advocate in Washington D.C. The Ingram Group has been instrumental in the creation and rollout of the Racehorse Health & Safety Act (RHSA) of 2023, introduced in Congress as a better, more transparent, inclusive, and cost-effective alternative to HISA.

Tina Bond, president of the New York Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association, will discuss her “The Heart of Horse Racing” project, launched this fall to use video testimonials of horsemen, jockeys, backstretch workers, and other racing participants (including fans) to share the positive aspects about the sport and why they love it. Theheartofhorseracing.com was created as part of a larger campaign to attract people to the races. The campaign, coordinated by the New York-based marketing company FINN Partners, started collecting market data last June. Among the findings: 62% of survey respondents had a favorable perception of horse racing, compared to 10% with an unfavorable perception. However, 27% had concerns about horse welfare and 79 percent did not view racing as “family-friendly and inclusive.”

The “Today’s Workforce Issues” panel is particularly timely given today’s immigration climate. Speakers will be Oscar Gonzales, the California Horse Racing Board’s vice chair and who worked in the Biden administration in the U.S. Department of Agriculture as well as serving as a senior advisor on immigration; prominent immigration lawyer Will Velie; and Remi Bellocq, a former CEO of the National HBPA who left in 2011 to become executive director of Bluegrass Community and Technical College’s (BCTC) Equine Program.

The annual Kent Stirling Memorial Medication Panel will provide an update on the scientific investigation of testing thresholds for dietary and environmental substances, a research collaboration between the HBPA and the U.S. Trotting Association. The presenting researchers: Drs. Clara Fenger, Rob Holland, Kim Brewer, and Thomas Tobin.