Opening day at Saratoga. Nothing quite like it. Everything was in place Thursday for another spectacular summer season at the Spa.

Except for one thing. And, unless you have been vacationing on Mars for the past four months, you know what that is.

When racing began on Thursday for the 152nd time, the major players were in town. Mechanicville's Chad Brown was ready to defend his training title for the second straight summer. Todd Pletcher, who has won more training titles than anyone else, was also here.

The best jockey colony in the land was ready to rock and roll, too. The Ortiz brothers and Johnny Velazquez and Javier Castellano, too.

And, of course, the horses. The stars of the show every summer are the thoroughbreds and they never disappoint.

Back to what is missing. You know, now, right? Of course you do. People. All kinds of people.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the gates to the old Spa stayed shut to the masses. And, for the foreseeable future, that is the way it is going to stay. Not having fans at Saratoga seems absolutely, positively, unquestionably impossible. In the long and storied history of the Capital Region's horse park, spectators have never been told they could not come.

Even when there was the 1918 Spanish flue pandemic, people came to the races.

The coronavirus pandemic has shut down the Spa to the people. And, yes, spectators who have come here for years and years are disappointed. And frustrated. And mad. When Saratoga started on Thursday, the only way people who longed to be here could watch the races was on television.

That had to be weird for them. And, believe me, it was weird for everyone who was allowed to be on the grounds for the 10-race card. Trainers and jockeys and jockey valets and grooms and NYRA employees were all here. So was the media, to document such a historic event.

"It's the world we are living in now," jockey Manny Franco said a few days before the meet started. "Not seeing anyone in the grandstand? Weird."

The only sliver of silver lining in all of this is that at least the track is running. Look at all the events around the world that have been KO'd by COVID-19. The Olympics, for goodness sake, was called off.

Franco and five other riders came out of the jockeys' room 12 minutes before the start of the first race, scheduled to go off at 1:10 p.m. They all took the familiar route, taking a right out of the room and walking down the horse path to the paddock. On a normal day, they would all be besieged by young fans begging for an autograph.

That first race was a race that would have had the crowd roaring. Grit and Glory, ridden by apprentice Luis Cardenas, won the stretch duel by a neck over Franco's mount, Jerome Avenue. It gave trainer Linda Rice the first of her two wins on the afternoon. As ecstatic as she was for the win, there was also a twinge of sadness. She missed the fans who loyally come to Saratoga day after day, year after year.

"It's not the same without them," she said. "When I came in and saw the empty grandstand and all the picnic tables empty and no one there to share in all the excitement, that was pretty strange."

The roar would have been deafening with people in the house and longtime NYRA announcer John Imbriale, in his first full Saratoga season, would have been the catalyst for that. Instead, his solid-as-always call was heard by a smattering of people who were lined along the fence on the apron. All those were people who worked with the horses, along with other essential workers.

Very little cheering, except by those associated with the winner. A strange, surreal feeling. Sounds on the track: horses hooves on dirt and turf, jockeys chirping to their mounts. You don't hear that when the stands are full.

"It's the hand you are dealt with and you have to play it," Imbriale said before the card started. "If I can't get pumped up or excited about calling races at Saratoga, whether there are people here or not, I am missing the boat."

The emptiness also struck a chord with Saratoga's favorite son, Mechanicville's Brown. He won the co-featured Peter Pan with Country Grammer and might have a Travers horse on his hands. But he felt bad for those who could not be here. He's a local. He understands what this meet means to so many.

"It's been a tough day," Brown said. "Walking around ... I never thought I'd see that. It's definitely a bittersweet day when this beautiful place is empty where I grew up. Hopefully, this is the only year we have to do this."

I hear you, Chad. It was tough enough to do it on Thursday. Now we have to do it for 39 more days.

twilkin@timesunion.com 518-454-5415 @tjwilkin

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Wilkin: Never a Saratoga opening day like this one - Times Union