DEL MAR, Calif. -- The 37-day horse racing meet at the Del Mar Racetrack opened Wednesday, featuring "The One and Only Truly Fabulous Hats Contest" and the $100,000 Oceanside Stakes.

The hat contest, in its 17th year, has four categories: Most Glamorous, Best Racing Theme, Funniest or Most Outrageous and Best Flowers/Others.

"After watching the royal wedding this spring, it seems that no outfit is complete without a hat," said Julie Sarno, who started the contest in 1995.

She said women "are more daring about what they will put on their heads" since the wedding.

The winner in each category will win $300. The event takes place at the Stretch Run Plaza de Mexico, next to the fountain.

The Oceanside Stakes, for 3-year-olds running one mile on turf, is the first of 42 stakes races in Del Mar's 72nd season of racing, which takes place Wednesday through Sunday through Sept. 7.

Opening day last year attracted a track-record attendance of 45,309.

While attendance has increased, attracting horses has not been as easy. Thoroughbred horse racing is on the decline across the country. In 2005, 3,707 foals were born in California. Last year, the number was just 1,891.

The annual cost of training a horse is $35,000, and more owners are getting out of the business. Del Mar's Racing Club has an incentive program to try to lure out-of-state trainers to the track.

"What we did is simply say come on out from out of state, we'll give you a thousand bucks when you start your horse and a 20 percent bonus on anything you win and that seems to be working. We've had some nice stables come in that we don't normally see from out of state and I think they'll be coming in throughout the meet when they see how well it's working," said Del Mar Racetrack CEO Joe Harper.

Harper said they have roughly 2,000 horses to pull from in Del Mar, approximately 200 more than last year.

Dallas Keen brought fifteen horses from Texas. He hasn't raced his horses in Del Mar in nearly 20 years.

"We're a long way from home, so the shipping is part of it, $1,000 is a start to help pay for the hauling of the horses," said Keen.

Some owners are sharing the cost.

"Fractional ownership is the wave of the future, it's what everybody does with jets and now we do it with horses. It doesn't matter if you own 5 percent, 10 percent, 20 percent, 30 percent, 100 percent," said owner Bill Koch.

"It was a hobby for a lot of people, and that's probably one of the first things to go, the hobby instead of their business," said horse owner and trainer Vann Belvoir, who brought seven of his horses from Washington.

And if any of his horses win, there's another bonus on top of the prize money.

"If you get lucky to win your first start, you get 20 percent bonus on top of what the horse makes. If he makes $20,000, you're going to get $4,000 more," said Belvoir.

However, bettors will be the one's picking up the tab in the long run. In order to cover the expense of paying out-of-state owners the incentives, Del Mar had to take a bigger percentage of the money bet at the window. That means payouts on winning bets will be smaller.

"We did raise the take out a bit this year and it's upset a few folks," said Del Mar Thoroughbred Club Executive Vice President Tom Robbins.

"If they're doing it here now because they can't keep horses in, well then, I guess we suffer again, don't we?" said Orange County resident David Newman who has been betting at Del Mar for decades.

"It's a tough deal but you have to have horses to bet on. We have to have clients who put horses in our barns," said Belvoir.