Racing where the Turf meets Surf

ThinkstockDelMar Del Mar racetrack at sunset. PICTURE / THINKSTOCK

Betty Grable, Bob Hope, Desi Arnaz, Cary Grant, Jimmy Durante, Cecil B DeMille, Bing Crosby.
Names that bring to many of us a bygoneera of movie stars, singers and figures in the entertainment industry who are slowly drifting away from us as the years go by.
But they do not drift away at Del Mar Racecourse, 20 miles north of San Diego, California where each has a stakes race for thoroughbreds named after them. It was the film stars of the 30s and 40s that made this racetrack famous and they will not be forgotten there, or in the annals of thoroughbred racing.
Del Mar is a seaside city and has long been the playground for the stars of the screen and it was there, at 2260 Jimmy Durante Boulevard, that Bing Crosby welcomed the first fans through the gates at the track when it opened in 1937. With its buildings designed in the Spanish Colonial Revival architectural style, Del Mar Racetrack is close to the beaches - you can walk there from the track - and its history is linked to the icons of the golden era of Hollywood.
Seabiscuit was the first thoroughbred to bring his champion style to the track when he won a match race there in 1938 by a nose over Ligaroti.
In the 40s on any given day you might run into Dorothy Lamour or WC Fields, Ava Gardner or Red Skelton, Bob or Bing - though for a period during those years the track was used as a training ground by the Marines and as a manufacturing site for parts for the B17 bombers.
Once the Second World War was over the track returned back to its thoroughbred roots.
Bing's recording of Where the Surf Meets the Turf shot up the charts and was played every day at the track as patrons came in for a summer's day of racing - Mickey Rooney and Lucile Ball were frequent attendees but none more so than Jimmy Durante! A keen racing man and a musical legend, the track honoured him by naming its turf course after him and the city renamed the main thoroughfare to the track in his honour as well.
In 1949 a young rider set a record of 52 wins at the summer meeting as an apprentice - Willy Shoemaker!
It was in 1977 that Bing made his final visit to Del Mar and his memory lives on by virtue of lore, legend, reputation and the rendition every race day of his hit song dedicated to the track.
Nowadays Del Mar is still the summer home of California horse racing where from mid-July through to early September they race for six days a week for seven weeks and any given race day you have crowds in excess of 20,000. And calling the races with his familiar "And away they go!" is South African commentator, Trevor Denman who has been the voice of Californian racing since 1984. Late autumn Del Mar has a four-week meeting that, in 2017, will include the Breeders' Cup, a series of 13 Championship races that culminate in the Breeders' Cup Classic with a $5 million purse, won this year by the three-year-old Triple Crown winner, American Pharoah.
Tradition and Hollywood still go hand-in-hand today "where the surf meets the turf".