Report: 'Hardware Failure' Of Third-Party Supplier Responsible For Saturday's Tote Issues

Tracks from Florida to California experienced technical issues Saturday related to AmTote, the totalisator system that handles wagering, delaying payouts, odds displays, and even prompting officials at Tampa Bay Downs in Oldsmar, Fla., to run its most important event, the Grade 3 Tampa Bay Derby, as a non-betting exhibition contest. Tampa Bay Downs was forced to cancel the final race on Saturday on what is traditionally its biggest day of the year.

The outage, which was caused by a failure at the AmTote hub in Hunt Valley, Md., occurred around 4:45 p.m. ET after Waskesiu won the G3 Tampa Bay Oaks. The track was unable to post the winning payoffs after the race was declared official.

Sunday, via a joint statement from AmTote International, the tote system that is part of the Stronach Group's 1/ST Technology, and Roberts Communications Network, it was revealed that the issue was a loss of connectivity on both the primary and backup broadband links to Tampa Bay Downs. 

On Monday, the Daily Racing Form clarified that broadband services are provided to RCN by a company called Lumen. Lumen's contract with RCN includes two separately-maintained broadband links, but both unexpectedly went down at the same time on Saturday.

Todd Roberts, the founder and president of RCN, told DRF that the outage had nothing to do with either RCN or AmTote.

“We know it was a hardware failure on [Lumen’s] part, but that’s all we know right now,” Roberts told DRF.

Roberts said officials attempted to re-route the necessary data to Tampa, but found that the track's two in-house networks - Comcast and Time-Warner - were also out. Roberts believes those two services are also provided connectivity via Lumen.

“I just feel very bad for Tampa Bay,” Roberts told DRF. “They are a longtime customer, and it was their biggest day of racing. That’s why I’m pulling my hair out on this.”

Read more at the Daily Racing Form, and this related story: Tampa Bay Downs explained how it was handling payouts.