Chief Stipe

Agreed. All they do is undermine racing. The Spring Racing Carnivals in Australia would suggest otherwise. The "social license" construct is just that - a social construct that doesn't actually have much factual evidence to support it. There never was 100% support of Racing. There doesn't need to be. As the election of Trump has shown the majority are sick and tired of woke politics and the elite left trying to tell us what is right and wrong. So you will be protesting during Cup week like you have been for the last 30 years?

I must say I've never seen such a high pressure system that far south of NZ.

Not looking good for the last day.

Friday Morning Weather: Overcast Track: Soft 7 Moisture Meter: 51.4% Rail: True Rainfall: No Rain Last 24 Hours | 9mm Rain Last 7 Days Irrigation: 18mm Last 24 Hours Weather and Track updated at 9.10am Friday 8 November Thursday Morning Weather: Fine Track: Soft 6 Moisture Meter: 42.3% Rail: True Rainfall: No Rain Last 24 Hours | 9mm Rain Last 7 Days Irrigation: 10mm to be applied today Weather and Track updated at 10.53 Thursday 7 November https://loveracing.nz/News/47212/TRACKPREVIEWPukekohePark-Thursday7November.aspx Withdrawal Morning Weather: Fine Track: Soft 7 Moisture Meter: 50.9% Rail: True Rainfall: No Rain Last 24 Hours | 9mm Rain Last 7 Days Irrigation: 12mm Irrigation Applied Over Weekend Weather and Track updated at 8.55am Wednesday 6 November Nomination Morning Weather: Overcast Track: Heavy 8 Moisture Meter: 51.8% Rail: True Rainfall: 1mm Rain Last 24 Hours | 9mm Rain Last 7 Days Irrigation: 12mm Irrigation Applied Over Weekend Weather and Track updated at 9.12am Tuesday 5 November

Penetrometer reading? Or even ideally a Going Stick reading? Moisture Meter 51.4%. Nomination Morning Weather: Overcast Track: Soft 7 Moisture Meter: 51.4% Rail: True Rainfall: No Rain Last 24 Hours | 9mm Rain Last 7 Days Irrigation: 18mm Last 24 Hours Weather and Track updated at 9.15am Friday 8 November

What have ships sinking got to do with manufacturing delays? One involves transport the other involves making stuff that gets transported.

Well that's good then @Thomass. The game needs trainspotters watching a mid-week race meeting. Good spotting because I'm sure the Stewards required the bunker to review the race endlessly counting whip strikes. Has the icon on your rewind button been worn off yet?

Hardly "punishing". He used the whip twice in consecutive strides. Daft rule and most viewers wouldn't see it unless like you they trawl through the Stipes reports.

Hokitika could get well over 150mm of rain in the next week.

Lived there for 20 years and 18 years on the West Coast. I always remember Cup week being high 20's with a Nor'West foehn wind blowing in Canterbury and dumping rain measured in feet on the West Coast. I worked for Apple Fields for a time and did research on the first two weeks of November. If you got a normal hot week or two in those weeks you could accurately predict the apple crop by measuring the heat units. This is the map for Friday next week. Classic Nor West.

40 degrees at Ipswich today! "If it wasn't almost 40 degrees here at Ipswich today, this would be unbelievable."

From my memory those are typical Cup Week temperatures. Great racing!!

TikTok - Make Your Day.mp4

The quality of the 2000 Guineas field has very little to do with where it is held. The issue is a screwed pattern which has been stuffed up even more this year with two key lead up races being cancelled and then moved to other locations. Add to that a high attrition rate and the field quality has suffered. Of course one of the key factors undermining everything is the appalling state of our tracks. Ellerslie isn't the saviour either. Why spend all that money on an experimental surface and not fix the constraints with the bends?

I think he should let go of the OBC conspiracy stuff. I was listening to Maurice Williamson yesterday discussing politics and he quoted Muldoon. Muldoon said if you have a problem and the choice is between a conspiracy and a cockup always go for the cockup. So in this case it isn't a conspiracy that has caused these problems it is basically incompetence either caused by the wrong people making the wrong decisions or the constraints of a lack of resources directed at the problems. Does anyone really think that @Huey 's the imaginary Waikato Mafia want tracks they way they are?

Sheila, Symons' confidence in Knight www.racing.com He may have been discounted by the punting public, but John Symons and Sheila Laxon had genuine belief that their horse Knight's Choice could make his presence felt in Tuesday's Melbourne Cup. "When we left here yesterday morning, we were thinking top five for sure and certain," Symons said from Macedon Lodge on Wednesday morning. "As we drove home from here yesterday morning to get changed to go to the races, I said to Sheila, 'What are you really thinking? Where do you reckon'? And she said, 'I reckon he'll win'." Knight's Choice jumped as a $91 chance, but Symons noted how significant it was for him to be on a Good track and that he'd been unlucky in last week's Bendigo Cup. "I know he was any old price but at the end of the day, it was only because he was running on wet tracks and he's an absolute duffer on wet tracks," Symons said. "I'm sure if it had have been dry, you would have seen a different horse going through those races and he certainly wouldn't have been the odds he was." WATCH: Team Knight's Choice addresses the media Knight's Choice rose to prominence as a three-year-old in the winter of 2023, winning four races on end, culminating in the G3 Winx Guineas on the Sunshine Coast. Given his record at the time over 1600m, Symons and Laxon set him for the Golden Eagle last spring, which he ended up finishing 13th in. "We realised straight away, at this level, he's not a miler, we need to go further," Symons explained. "Zac Lloyd had ridden him in work a few times, he said, 'This horse is just looking for ground'. "We took him back home and we tested him over 2000m. He won and we went home, we put him away and from that point on till yesterday, we were working towards the Melbourne Cup." As Symons reflected on what had transpired on Tuesday at Flemington, he acknowledged that it was one of the great moments of his life. "It's got to be one of the highlights," he said. "Any Group 1 race, but to win the pinnacle of the races in Australia and maybe the world when it comes to a handicap, two-mile race, you can't explain that. "To be able to do that and for Sheila to have been able to have done it, two-from-two and to have been involved with Laurie (Laxon) and herself when they had Empire Rose and Champagne, those horses, Sheila's got a phenomenal record of runners in the Melbourne Cup, besides the horses that she's actually trained. "It's just fantastic."

That's @holy ravioli for you. He is probably very distraught at the moment with the Left getting a hammering in the USA. As for Knight's Choice I started following the horse when he strung some very good wins together in Queensland. It was mentioned at the time by Laxon that he was being aimed for the MC. I thought his form was off this season until I read the detail that he liked a Good track. He got that in his lead up run and he couldn't get a run until late when he finished on strongly.

Yes but if you are racing handy on the pace you kinda get left hanging there in front.

Thanks

I would have taken it

So as an expert Jockey @Newmarket when should they have "gone"?

I agree.

And the other 23 went too late?