By Neto Baptiste
President of the Antigua Turf Club (ATC), Hansen Richards, has clarified that the body will not support any efforts to utilise lands outside of the Cassada Gardens Race Track for a proposed EC$30 million investment into a new facility.
Speaking on the Good Morning Jojo sports show, Richards said the popular venue, located a stone’s throw from the VC Bird International Airport, remains the location of choice for both the horse racing fraternity and the US-based investors.
“We brought the investors here to look at the Cassada Gardens Race Track. We met with the prime minister and the attorney general, and they were in favour of us investing into the facility and making it into a viable business product, so we are not entertaining anything about moving to any other location. I believe that would have come up within their discussions regarding the proposal we submitted for an extra piece or parcel of land to put down some more stables,” he said.
In a recent Cabinet note, the government said it had received a request from the Caravelle Group hoping to improve the Cassada Gardens Race track, but noted that “Cabinet is considering alternatives.”
Richards said that moving to a new location would further delay the planned return of racing, adding that once all is finalised, work at the current location could be restarted in hopes of having some races within months.
“As soon as the government meets with us and we come to an agreement, we will resume work at the facility which is going to take two to three months in terms of the race course, realigning and so forth, and we still have to look at horses and so forth coming into Antigua, and that has been part of our discussions with the investment group and they have given a commitment so far in assisting us with importing horses when the facility is up and running,” he said.
The turf boss went on to explain that plans are to build a sustainable business model suited to the Antigua and Barbuda market.
“In St Kitts and St Lucia, the developers at both facilities built out the racetracks, and they had no support model to sustain the racing, so what we did is agree to build out the sustainable business model while simultaneously upgrading the facility so the business model they are going to do is basically for their returns and investment. The agreement was that the Antigua Turf Club would remain as a promoting and marketing body along with the lease in our name, and we would give them part of the parcel to operate their business which would be gaming,” Richards said.
The turf club recently won a court battle against Carlton “Tyre Master” Lewis, giving them rights to the facility after the businessman claimed he had a valid lease for the property. The turf club won the case against Lewis in 2018 and then the appeal in 2022.