Greyhound racing in Iowa is starting its final lap. The Iowa Greyhound Park in Dubuque opened for the final time in a season that Racing and Gaming administrator Brian Ohorilko says it will last one month.

“It is a short meet the general manager indicated that he has plenty of greyhounds and enough personnel,” Ohorilko says. Ohorilko says the Racing and Gaming Commission approved a move prior to Saturday’s opening races to allow the season to have enough dogs to race.

“Part of being able to make that work we were informed that they needed to increase some of those purse amounts — and so some of the money that was being held in reserve from Iowa Greyhound park will go into the purse account,” he says. Ohorilko says it will end more than 35 years of dog track racing.

“It will be the last meet here in Iowa and then…there will not be greyhound racing in Iowa after this meet,” Ohoriko says. “And in fact, after this meet that after 2022, there will only be one state that has greyhound racing left, and that that is West Virginia.”

The Iowa Legislature approved a plan about seven years ago to phase out greyhound racing in the state. The final race at the Iowa Greyhound Park in Dubuque is on May 15th. The Racing and Gaming Commission website shows the first dog races began at the Dubuque Greyhound Park, which opened in June of 1985.