Longtime Pimlico Race Course official Chick Lang remembers renting an upper room at a Louisville hotel and dropping 2,000 yellow balloons with "Preakness" in black lettering onto unsuspecting watchers of the Kentucky Derby parade below. The stunt was designed to promote Baltimore's answer to the Derby.
Forty-eight years later, the iconic race that Lang calls "as much a part of Baltimore as the Shot Tower and the Inner Harbor" needs more than publicity. It might also need rescuing.
The middle jewel of racing's Triple Crown will run Saturday with an uncertain future, owing to the Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing in March of Magna Entertainment Corp., which owns Pimlico, Laurel Park and the rights to the Preakness Stakes.
As the 134th Preakness Stakes approaches at Pimlico, many Marylanders fear this could be the last one in Baltimore. It's a worry heightened in recent years because of Magna's financial problems and because slot machines have helped boost horse racing in other states.
State leaders have grown more confident this month that the Preakness will be back in 2010 and beyond, believing that Magna's recent decision to keep Pimlico and Laurel off the auction block for now leaves the state in a less precarious position. State and area leaders hope to use the added time to work with potential buyers of the tracks and keep the Preakness in Maryland.
"I think that's a step forward," said Orioles owner Peter Angelos, a longtime owner of thoroughbred horses who met with Gov. Martin O'Malley in March and said he was prepared to help Maryland keep the race.
"You can't just look at the Preakness individually," Angelos said in an interview. "It tells you what a significant role Marylanders historically have played in developing racing. What I did [in March] was merely point out that it seemed the Preakness might be moving away from Maryland. I think since that time, the concern I had has been substantially diminished."
Magna originally planned to sell the Maryland assets at auction this summer along with other holdings. In a filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware, attorneys for Magna Entertainment Corp. of Aurora, in Ontario Province, Canada, indicated they would still "explore all alternatives" with respect to the Maryland assets. Magna, one of the largest track owners in the country, last week received court permission to auction off many of its other assets, such as California's Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, Calif., in September.
