Thursday Thoughts with Jason Beem Jul. 11, 2024

A good Thursday morning to you all! Another opening day here at Colonial Downs upon us and wanted to share some general thoughts on the meet. I feel like this week on the show I didn’t pay as much attention to Saratoga opening as I normally would, but then I realized that most shows are talking about it non-stop. So that made me more at ease to talk Colonial because I’m here and I’m very excited about it. This will mark the sixth season for us here in Virginia since the reopening in 2019. It’s very rare to get a track to come back after it closed. It took a lot of work from a lot of people (and a lot of historical horse racing machines) to get things back in gear here and it’s been such a cool thing to be a part of the team as racing continues to grow. 

Each year here has a different feel. I think some of that is because the meet has changed a few different times in its short existence. Or re-existence if that’s a word. I also think some of how I remember it depends on where I was in my life each year. 

I was offered and accepted the announcing job here in February of 2019. We were just going to run five weeks that first summer and it kind of perfectly fit between the two parts of the Monmouth season I was going to cover for Frank Mirahmadi. I knew that Colonial always featured a lot of turf racing, but other than that I didn’t know much about it. I certainly didn’t know anything about Richmond, Virginia. That first season went by so quickly. I think I was here for a total of like 32 days or something like that. I stayed at my buddy Chris’ apartment and I feel like when I wasn’t at work I was just staying inside at his place because it was too hot outside. The one thing that really sticks out for me about that first year was racing at night and all the big crowds that showed up. Night racing just has such a special feel to it, and I’m glad we’re getting back to that on Fridays this year with a 4:30 p.m. (ET) first post.  

The pandemic year of 2020 was tough for a lot of folks for a lot of reasons. It was tough for us at Colonial as well. I think we lost one day to heat and then we lost the last three weeks of the six-week season to an outbreak of Covid in the jocks room. Also the day before the season was cancelled my Grandma Beem passed away. I remember driving back to Seattle frustrated about how it all went down and sad about my Grandma. I was truly wondering if I wanted to go back again. I’m glad I did. In 2021 and 2022 our season grew in length and so did handle and attention. I got to work with one of my best friends in the world for those two summers and we had a blast. 

Last year with CDI taking over and moving back to weekends how things would change. Honestly for me they didn’t change all that much. Colonial is such a challenging track to work at as a racecaller and I find the races very exciting to call. It’s truly fulfilling work. The season is so short and goes by so fast that I try to remind myself often during these weeks to appreciate getting to be a part of it. I really think we’re primed to take another step forward this season and hope that’s the case (and the weather cooperates!)

I hope you’ll join us for the next nine weeks of racing here in the Commonwealth of Virginia!