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Otago Racing Club @ Wingatui, Sunday 1 June 2025
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Otago Racing Club @ Wingatui, Friday 23 May 2025
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oh and while i'm at it. in 2021 hrnz did a survey. they published the results. 95.93 % of the 500 who replied said they checked the hrnz website and 79% said they did that daily. now i would say,if you doing a survey via the hrnz website,the numbers will obviouly be skewed significantly that way anyway,but still they are noteworthy. yet the hrnz website is just average in my opinion,because it often breaks down, .Just this week it did it again when the races were on and you couldn't access details of the hoses.The uploading of the results and videos is pathetically slow. The gallopers love racing have theirs on within 5 minutes,but with the harness its often hours later.And they fail to have the unhinged content on there. When asked how often do you look at the hrnz facebook page,50% said never.And 83% didn't know hrnz has 2 facebook pages. 87% said they never look at the hrnz twitter account. 38% said hrnz does not communicate well. now thats obviously an indication that hrnz target audience is older. -
By All The Aces · Posted
Spotted photos of the HOTY Awards. La Dorada Named Champion 2yo -
if i was being honest,i don't think your queensland product is anywhere near as good as our canterbury product and that is why there is not much interest in harness racing there and i think several of the other states have the same public perception issues.I think you seem to agree. i see no reason why it would improve over there and it just makes sense it will get worse as the filelds are often dominated by multiple runners from the high profile stables. your horses are as good,but i've watched enough of your queensland product to realise i just don't think everyone is trying each time and theres too much team driving,so i wouldn't bet on your product again for that reason. And i say that as having been someone who starting during covid, watched and did the form on every race run in queensland for about 8 months and for the last 5 months of those spent about an average of $100 on 2 different accounts($200 total) per race,on every harness race run in queensland.whether it be marburg or redcliffe or albion park i gave up for 2 reasons,1)i didn't trust the drivers to try each time and was often left feeling i was taken for a ride and as you know,i don't like that. and 2)because the nz tab promised they would invite me into the elite punters rewards thing if i met turnover criteria of around $100,000 per annum on any account. I was at that time an elite customer on one account already and they promised to make me the same on the other account when i met that turnover threshold. Well i met the turnover threshlod. But when i rung our tab and asked when am i going to get the email saying i was entitlied to rewards,they told me,tough luck,yes i met the turnover threshold but i wasn't going to be getting into the elite rewards club. No reason given,just tough luck ,don't ring us again type thing. so i was already frustrated with some of the queenland harness drivers,remember i started threads on here about the likes of one of the barnes brothers,so i took my $2000 a day spend on the nz tab on queensland harness racing at the time and stopped all together. thats how the nz tab worked at the time. Just idiots running it. anyway,so i think i have an informed opinion as far as queensland harness racing goes. as to nz.In the last 20 years the intergenerational transfer of interest in the harness racing sport has slowly evaporated. 20 years ago,most people over 45 gambled,whether it be regularly or occasionally on harness racing. But their children haven't . When i worked at the big factory where 25% would have been punters or my other job where 85% were, one of the biggest things that struck me was just how many people over 50 followed the sport. And what also struck me was just how little following the sport got from people in their 20's at that time.if you drew a graph you could see the decline on a steady downwards trend based on age. Most of the under 25 year olds talked about gaming,more smoked weed than didn't and there was some who watched a lot of porn. Actually one bloke, who i ate lunch with each day,he was a bit of a character. Every day i would say to him,what did you do last night. Every day he would say,went home,smoked a bit of week,had a w... while i watched porn and played on line poker and did a bit of gaming. Now occasionally he would add,f... the misses,shes after something ,i guess i'll find out. Actually i'm drifting off topic again,but the point is those blokes will be in their 40's now and i know they won't be betting on racing like the previous genreation did. i've always said ,hrnz and all racing adminsitrators have not put enough resources into promoting the particpation of over 50 year old people. Decade after decade,i call them the dumb administrators,have foccussed resources on getting young people into the game when they would have been far more successful directing those promtional resources into the over 50 year olds and not only getting more over 50 year olds involved,but working on a plan to use those over 50 year olds to expose the younger members of their families and friends to the sport and get that intergenreration transfer of interest.. Like,how many decades have we heard the dumb people say ,we need more young people,yet the bright sparks that say that have never have come up with a strategy that works to get them involved. Its such flawed and dumb as thinking. The current HRNZ people seem some of the dumbest yet in that respect.But ou can't just blame the current administrators as those that have gone before them have had the same mindset. tabforever said earlier,his marketing expert says target existing or past customers to builfd your base back up. I said i fully agreed and said not only that,harness racfing need to also target the same demograophic of the current current or past customers. it actually surprises me that people don't see just how much harness racing is declining in canterbury.They will see in 5-10 years. sadly a lot of is issues are outside the control of any adminstrator or smart thinking person.
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By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Sadhbh scored a popular win at Te Rapa on Sunday when she broke through for her maiden victory in the Zappy – Send Couriers? Shipzappy.com 1500. The five-year-old daughter of Darci Brahma was bred and is raced by renowned racing photographer Trish Dunell, who was delighted to see her win while on the tools at Te Rapa. Dunell has taken a patient approach with her mare, who has just had the seven starts and has really come of age this preparation, placing in all three of her starts this time in before her weekend triumph. Punters took note and backed her into $2.80 favouritism, and she didn’t disappoint, with jockey Opie Bosson taking the shortest way home to score by a nose over Intoxicated, giving former The Oaks Stud stallion Darci Brahma the quinella. Trainer Pam Gerard was duly pleased to get the win and said she will improve over more ground. “She probably needed blinkers on, which we put on her today, but you won’t see the best of her until she steps up to 2000m,” she said. “Opie said he was niggling her along the whole way, but once he gave her one behind the saddle she took off. “She needs a better track too, but the weather has been pretty wet up here in the north and she’s been toughing it out to place on Heavy10 tracks. “The ability’s always been there, but she’s been such a big filly and mare we’ve just had to wait for her. “She’s learning to settle and run on, so is working it out to be a racehorse. She’s still got some filling out to do but come the autumn I think she’ll be pretty competitive in some nice races up in trip. “I’m really pleased to have won a race for Trish. She’s bred a really nice mare from a lovely family and just loves her horses to bits.” Sadhbh is regally bred, being out of Giant Mystique, a half-sister to former Singapore Horse of the Year War Affair, and is the dam of Group One performer Charles Road and stakes performer Cavallo Veloce. “She (Sadhbh) was the last one, having lost the mum, so I was never going to sell her,” Dunell said. Sadhbh has taken plenty of time to mature, having three starts as a three-year-old before a 16-month hiatus from racing and she returned in June a more developed horse and has run accordingly. “She is quite tall and she just keeps on growing, even now,” Dunell said. “But she is just lovely.” Dunell is excited about the future with her mare, particularly when she gets over further ground. “She is really going to be a stayer,” she said. “After that race, the girl who looks after her said that you wouldn’t have known she had a race at all, she was just so settled, and you couldn’t even hear her breathing she was so quiet.” Dunell has also enjoyed recent success across the Tasman, with full-sisters Spylark and Halliwell tasting success for trainers Dane Smith and Jessica Tzaferis respectively, the latter having posted four successive victories over winter. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Trent Didham has become the fourth generation in his family to become a trainer after joining his father, Peter, in partnership earlier this month. The Awapuni horsemen have lined up four horses together in the last week, recording two runner-up results at Awapuni’s synthetic meeting on Sunday, a day that had three generations of the family on track. “It was pretty cool to do it (commence training) with Dad in partnership, I am pretty proud,” Trent Didham said. “Grandad was there as well (on Sunday), which was good. He trained a few and took a few to Australia, and even his father before him was a trainer.” Born into the industry, the 27-year-old has always been destined to follow his forebears into the industry. “I have always been around it. Robbie Hannam is my uncle, so I was born into it,” he said. “I grew up, until I was five, at Awapuni where Dad was the track manager and then we moved out to Wellfield (Lodge, stud farm),” Didham said. Growing up at Wellfield Lodge helped lay a strong foundation for a career in the industry for Didham, but he said racing was always where his passion lay. “It was good to get a base with the stud work, but the racing side of the industry was what I was always interested in,” he said. While Didham has spent the majority of his working life under the tutelage of his father, he has spent several years across the Tasman working for some of Australia’s leading trainers. “I worked for just under a year for Mick Price and two years for John O’Shea,” he said. In-between those stints, Didham’s father raised the idea of entering a training partnership, but Didham felt like he had more to learn before heading down that path. “The idea was put forward by my old man a couple of years ago, but I said to him I wasn’t ready, and I wanted to work for someone overseas again,” he said. “I went and did that and then decided to come back and give it a crack.” The father-and-son duo are still in search of their first victory and they are hoping it will come this weekend when their promising four-year-old Lucullan resumes at Trentham. The son of Rich Enuff has won one and placed in three of his four starts to date and opened his preparation with a pleasing 800m trial win at Waverley earlier this month. “Lucullan will kick-off his campaign this Saturday and he is one to look out for,” Didham said. “His main target is the Stewards (Listed, 1200m) down south. “We will get through Saturday and hopefully he will head towards that.” View the full article
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