CDI Has Applied For Retail Sportsbook Licenses At All Its Kentucky Venues

Written By Matthew Bain on July 12, 2023
CDI applies for retail sportsbook licenses at all Kentucky facilities

Churchill Downs Inc. has applied for retail sports betting licenses at all of its gambling facilities in Kentucky.

That’s according to Tonya Abeln, CDI’s vice president of communications, who emailed PlayKentucky Wednesday morning.

“CDI has applied for licenses for all of our established Kentucky racing and gaming facilities,” she wrote.

CDI sportsbooks across the state

That means Kentuckians can expect to see retail Kentucky sportsbooks at Churchill Downs, Derby City Gaming, Turfway Park, Newport Racing & Gaming, Oak Grove Racing & Gaming, and Ellis Park. A new Derby City Gaming in downtown Louisville is also set to open later this year.

Tuesday marked the first day Kentucky’s nine horse racetracks could begin applying for retail licenses. The Kentucky Horse Racing Commission approved on Monday a set of emergency regulations that will govern the state’s sports betting industry through launch.

Those regulations stipulate that the nine horse racing associations can have retail sportsbooks at their racetracks, as well as their affiliated simulcast facilities and historical horse racing gaming halls. In total, there are 14 such venues in Kentucky.

CDI owns eight of them.

Six — Churchill Downs, Derby City Gaming, Turfway Park, Newport Racing & Gaming, Oak Grove Racing & Gaming, and Ellis Park — are already open.

Two — Derby City Gaming in downtown Louisville and an Ellis Park extension site in Daviess County — are not open. The new Derby City Gaming will open later this year. The Ellis Park extension project, meanwhile, is in limbo after CDI pulled back on plans to build it at a shopping mall in Owensboro last month.

More online partner announcements coming soon

In addition, Abeln told PlayKentucky that CDI is still ironing out a few details with its additional online operating partners and will announce those deals when they are complete.

Currently, only FanDuel Sportsbook has confirmed its partnership with CDI. However, the Kentucky gambling giant has other pre-existing relationships with DraftKings and Bet365, too.

Photo by AP Photo/Garry Jones
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Matthew Bain

Matthew Bain started as a Content Manager for PlayKentucky and other Catena Media sites in 2022. He covered the launch of Massachusetts sports betting and the Prop 26 vs. Prop 27 battle in California. Before that, he spent six years as a sports reporter and then deputy sports editor for the Des Moines Register, during which time he won nine statewide journalism awards, including the Genevieve Mauck Stoufer Outstanding Young Iowa Journalists Award. As deputy sports editor, Matthew oversaw the Register's recruiting coverage while also innovating the outlet's high school sports coverage. Matthew graduated from San Diego State and grew up in California, but he's somehow a Boston Celtics fan. Long story.

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