ROCK SPRINGS — Sweetwater Downs will host the last three days of horse racing in Sweetwater County this Friday, including a race with a $300,000 purse on Saturday.

This weekend concludes seven weeks of races drawing hundreds of trainers, jockeys, owners and fans to the Sweetwater Events Complex grandstands.

According to Eugene Joyce, Sweetwater Downs president, the track was built in 1979 and ran races until around 1992, when it sat mothballed for 19 years. When Joyce arrived in 2011, there was no horse racing happening at the facility at all.

“So we started racing with just four days here,” Joyce said. “Now we’re up to 18.”

Joyce said the turnaround came with the addition of historical horse racing (HHR) terminals, which allowed purses to grow from roughly $25,000 a day to about $200,000 a day. Total purses at the track were $1.9 million last year and have climbed to $3.5 million this year. Joyce said purses are projected to reach $5 million next year with the addition of another OTB facility in Evanston. 

Joyce said a private contract with a horsemen’s representative group allocates a percentage of HHR revenue to the purse account, along with a portion set aside for the Wyoming-bred fund. According to Joyce, this fund has allowed better jockeys to race and allowed horse breeding in Wyoming to stand among the best in the nation.

Most of the horses racing at Sweetwater Downs come from owners in Wyoming, Utah and Colorado, but some travel from as far as Louisiana, Oklahoma, California and New Mexico. 

He said about half of the horses running this year were bred in Wyoming, compared to roughly 8% when he started 15 years ago, an increase he attributed to breeder incentive programs that paid out more than $10 million this year.

The track runs a mix of about 65% quarter horse races and 35% thoroughbred races, with fields averaging just over eight horses.

Joyce credited the Sweetwater Events Complex for its partnership with the track, saying Sweetwater Downs invested millions of dollars into upgrades, including construction of the grandstand building and racing office, along with roughly $2 million in track maintenance equipment.

“This was a wasting asset for Sweetwater County,” Joyce said. “We brought it back to life, and hopefully it’s a point of pride for the community.”