SD Trainer Didn’t Know If Racing In ND Was Going To Be Possible Due To COVID-19

Haar has around 30 to 40 horses competing in races at the North Dakota Horse Park.

FARGO, N.D – Training horses comes naturally to Amanda Haar.

It’s all she’s known ever since she was a little girl watching her dad do the same.

Haar is from Aberdeen and has been coming to North Dakota Horse Park for the last seven years.

“To come here is honestly probably our favorite track to race at, so to hear that is going and even if it’s just the two weekends, we are more than ready for it,” Haar says.

Because of COVID-19, there was a moment where she did not know if she was going to be able to do what she loves the most.

“Just knowing that you know, you got to still keep them prepared and I’m keeping the horses with us the whole time and still being able to get to run them at the tracks that could,” she says.

Haar says the staff at the horse park has been doing a great a job in making sure everyone feels safe.

“He told us, if you guys want to wear masks, you guys can, if you don’t want to, it’s fine, keep your social distance and we’ve done our best to do so,” she adds.

For the park, safety has always remained the number one priority.

“We looked at even racing with no fans, and so we’ve looked at all the options right at the beginning, so it’s been kind of a progression, where as the restrictions got released a little bit, then we were able to do a little bit more and more. I wouldn’t call it full event mode, but pretty close,” says General Manager of the North Dakota  Horse Park, Mark Bjerke .

Those extra safety measures include adding extra hand washing stations, putting hand sanitizers all over the park and putting exes on the floor for social distancing.