UA News

Reed heads the UA's unique Race Track Industry Program, which prepares students for careers in the horse racing business.

Name
Doug Reed

Position
Director, Race Track Industry Program

Number of years at the UA
15

Favorite part about working at the UA
"The diversity of my job and the diversity, too, of the University. ... The diversity in my job in the fact that it's not just teaching, it's not just administration. It's also running one of the largest conferences and dealing with students. And the environment of the University, I love."

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Inside Doug Reed's office, horses leap across the walls in a variety of paintings. Outside the door, in the lobby, the TV is tuned to a horse race, which many of his students are attending in California.

Reed is director of the UA's Race Track Industry Program, the only program of its kind in the United States.

Part of the UA's animal science department, the program, established in 1974, prepares students for careers in various aspects of the horse racing industry, from breeding and training to marketing and track management.

A small and specialized degree program, it has an average enrollment of about 40 to 50 undergraduate and graduate students. Between 80 and 90 percent of them find jobs in the industry immediately after graduation, Reed says.

Reed, who's done everything in the racing business from mowing lawns to managing tracks, heads the industry-renowned program and is one of its three core faculty members, teaching courses on racetrack management and racing department organization and administration.

He took time to talk with Lo Que Pasa about his work preparing students for a unique career track.

How did this program come to be at the UA?
It's actually an interesting story. A couple people in the industry ... were talking about trying to get good, highly educated people in positions to run racetracks and they were having difficulty. They thought there should be a degree-type academic program to produce people like that, and basically they went around and shopped the idea to several universities and actually the University of Arizona was the only one that said, "We'll try it."

And this is the only program of its kind?
There is something similar, a little different, at Louisville; the University of Louisville has a program that is geared toward all horse businesses. Where we are different is we are specifically (geared toward) racing. And I always tell people who don't know anything about our industry (that) it's not a whole lot different than, say, hotel management schools. ... This is racetrack management school, and it's very much the entertainment business, the hospitality business, the sports business. It's almost a cross between a hospitality and sports management program but geared specifically for what's called the pari-mutuel industry, which has the added aspect of the gambling. We don't teach them (students) how to gamble, but we teach them how to run a business that includes that aspect.

How important is it to have this kind of specialized degree as opposed to a more general business degree?
I think it helps a whole lot. We have two paths; we have what we call the animal path and the business path. ... If you're going the animal path you take equine science courses and animal courses and some business courses, but you also get a good broad-based knowledge of the entire industry. (It's) the same with the business (path) students. They take what I'll call generic business courses, (and) they take specific racing business courses. ... It is a complex industry because of a number of aspects – you've got the animals and the sport (and) you've got a highly regulated business, because every state has a regulatory board because of the gambling aspect and the horse aspect, (for) the safety and welfare (of the animals). And then you have all the aspects of running a business that includes food and beverage and hospitality and putting on a show.

What kind of jobs do students go on to get?
The animal side is for people who want to maybe train race horses or manage a farm, a breeding farm, or be involved in farm management (as) bloodstock agent(s) as they're called, which are people who buy and sell horses or analyze horses for value. ... The other one (business path) is quite diverse. Because of the nature of the business there's a need for many kinds of management people whether it be (in) marketing (or) operations, so they get jobs in track management in the various types of departments.

What kind of internship opportunities do you offer?
That's actually something that's really great; we have more (people) wanting our interns than we have interns, which is a nice position to be in. So we have a high demand and we can pretty much place a student, almost, in the type of internship they want. ... We've had, on the animal side, people at breeding farms or working right with a horse trainer. On the track side we've had them at the top New York tracks, the Del Mar track (in) Florida, Kentucky, and in a variety of different jobs. ... We've even had international internships.

Where do most of your students come from?
Not surprising, we have a much higher percentage of out-of-state students, although we have a fair number of Arizona students. We get them from where racing's popular. Our greatest markets, I would say, are California, New York and New Jersey, closely followed by several of the East Coast states, Florida, Kentucky. ... We don't get too many students who just say, "I don't know what I want to do so I'll try this." They usually come with some kind of introduction or knowledge of the business already.

The UA hosts the largest industry conference in North America?
In the industry, they say if you can only go to one conference this is the one to go to. ... For the students it's tremendous  because I don't know any other program that brings anywhere from 600 to 1,000 people here every year that might hire them. I tell my students, for you guys it's like a job fair, it's not a conference. I mean, realistically, a good student can network and have a lot of doors open or at least a lot of résumés passed out.

Have the budget cuts had much of an impact on your program?
Luckily we get probably about 70 percent of our funding from the industry, so the good side is it doesn't affect us as much because we have been so industry-supported (and) the program does a lot of its own fundraising. The bad side is a lot of our fundraising comes through the conference, and all conferences are down – we're going to be down this year because of the economy.

How did you get interested in horse racing?
My dad liked to go maybe five, 10 times a year, just as entertainment. ... He took the family to the Maryland State Fair and they had horse races at the fair. I just got interested in it from there.

How did you get your start in the industry?
Back when I was starting in the business a lot of people told me it's who you know and it's a family-run business. I had none of that (those connections), so basically I just kept kicking doors down and started on a maintenance crew during summer in college, working maintenance at a racetrack to get my foot in the door – (cleaning up) trash and mowing the lawns.

Where did you move up from there?
I started out as what's called a racing official. ... Other sports have referees or umpires. (In horse racing) they call them officials. ... So I worked at a large number of tracks, started in Maryland and then moved up and down the East Coast, as a racing official, then eventually became what's called a racing secretary. It's the person in charge of the racing department. ... They fill the races. They're in charge of the entire show. So I was racing secretary at tracks like Arlington Park in Chicago, Oaklawn Park in Arkansas, Rockingham Park in New Hampshire, and then I moved into track management as a vice president in New Mexico for a company called Santa Fe Racing. We operated two tracks there – one in Albuquerque and one in Santa Fe. And from there I came to this program.

How has the industry changed since this program started in 1974?
It has dramatically changed from the mid-'80s until now. ... Before the '80s there was a whole lot less competition. There weren't casinos everywhere, Native American casinos. Lotteries were starting to grow in the '70s and then '80s. There was just a whole lot more growth of gaming and other types of competition, so that's been a challenge for the sport. The other thing is technology has changed the sport tremendously. When I started in the business the only way to go see a horse race was to go to where the horse race was. Now, in many states, (not Arizona) you can legally wager online through the Internet. And most facilities are broadcasting the races of other tracks, so you can go to a racetrack and bet 20 different tracks.

Do you bet on horses?
I occasionally go and maybe bet 40 or 50 dollars for an entire day for entertainment. ... If you don't bet any more than you can afford and you're betting what you would spend out at a night at the movies or dinner or something, it can be quite enjoyable. ...  I know when I pay the dinner ticket for $50 the $50 is gone. Sometimes I can go (to the racetrack) and spend $50 and come back with $75 or $100.

Have you been to the Kentucky Derby?
Only once, in '85. ... The reason I haven't gone back is because I got to go in such first-class style. I was the assistant racing secretary at Arlington Park, which is a major track in Chicago, and the next year I was promoted to racing secretary, and I went with my boss. My boss used to be the head racing person at Churchill Downs, so I had the ins and outs.  We parked in the barn area; they drove us around to the track. I watched the race from the placing judges' stand on the roof of the building.

What's the most exciting horse race you've ever seen?
It's still Secretariat winning the Belmont when I was a kid. I still get chills watching that tape. ... He won the Triple Crown and that series, those three races (the Belmont Stakes, Preakness Stakes and Kentucky Derby), hasn't been won since 1978. He won it in '73 and he won by a margin (of) what they call 31 lengths, which is a horse length, so you could line up 31 horses to the next horse. That's how far he was in front of everybody else.

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