page_title: Saratoga Race Course
section_title: In popular culture
hierarchical_section_title: Saratoga Race Course / In popular culture
caption_attribution_description: English: You are viewing an original 1865 drawing by famed artist Winslow Homer of the Race Track at Saratoga. The illustration is an original leaf from an August 1865 edition of Harper's Weekly, the most popular illustrated newspaper of the day.
context_page_description: Saratoga Race Course is a thoroughbred horse racing track located on Union Avenue in Saratoga Springs, New York, United States. Opened in 1863, it is often considered to be the oldest major sporting venue of any kind in the country, but is actually the fourth oldest racetrack in the US. In 1857 the Empire Race Course was opened on an island in the Hudson River near Albany, but was in operation only a short time.
  The Saratoga meet originally lasted only four days. The meet has been lengthened gradually since that time; for many decades, the meet lasted four weeks and began in late July or early August. The meet today lasts a total of 40 racing days, with races held five days per week, and traditionally spans from mid-July through Labor Day in early September.
context_section_description: The Race Course is the setting of a scene early on in the Ian Fleming James Bond novel Diamonds Are Forever.
  It also is the setting of Sherwood Anderson's short story "I Want to Know Why".
  Saratoga is also referenced in Carly Simon's 1972 #1 hit, "You're So Vain." The line "I hear you went up to Saratoga and your horse naturally won" refers to the Saratoga Race Course.
  The racetrack is referenced in the song "Adelaide's Lament" from the 1950 play Guys and Dolls in the line "When they get on that train to Niagara and she can hear church bells chime, the compartment is air conditioned and the mood sublime...then they get off at Saratoga for the fourteenth time!"
caption: Winslow Homer drawing from August 1865 Harper's Weekly
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