Chief Stipe

You still have a chance. Spot the trial with both 2yr old of the year finalists in it.

Regardless of Qualifications - where is he? MIA.

Yes and all the guns from last season.

Great. MIA Sharrock publishes this negative shyte.

Alleged at this stage. I think some comments elsewhere on social media have gone too far. So please everyone take care posting.

Isn't the only question that should be asked is why ANY synthetic track(s) (x 3) should have been considered? The answer was originally to reduce meeting abandonments. Well that hasn't happened. Still haven't seen a proper business case which reminds me of what wound @Pitman up so much. If my intuition is correct I would guess that the maintenance on the AWT'S is being short changed. If it isn't then in the absence of substantially increased funding then something else must be suffering. The rose gardens perhaps?

One of the studies you cited (the only one) essentially shows no difference.

I see no measures about the natural attrition/fatality rate of horses. What I know is it isn't zero.

If you accept that definition then you accept there is as much variance amongst turf tracks as you infer there is amongst synthetics. BTW Tapeta is a Trademark/Brand Name. Apart from that there is no difference between Tapeta and the NZ Polytrack AWT's. Their perceived safety is negated without proper maintenance/grooming at least once a day and ideally between each race. Not to mention the appropriate watering.

What's your point? Who actually cares? The punter doesn't. Those stakeholders that were on course know what happened. Get over youself Chazza the officials aren't there to appease your obsession!

Not based on the research you have posted can you come to such an emphatic conclusion. But isn't a polytrack exactly the same as a Tapeta i.e. a surface made from a mixture of silica sand, wax and artificial fibres. Tapeta: a Thoroughbred Racing and Training surface comprised of a carefully selected mixture of the finest silica sand, wax and fibres that have been extensively researched and simulate the root structure of turf. Martin Collins Polytrack: A mixture of silica sand, recycled synthetic fibers (carpet & spandex) and recycled rubber/pvc. In cold climates, the mixture may also include jelly cable (plastic insulation from copper phone wire). The entire mixture is coated with wax. What's the difference? I don't believe the evidence you produced is conclusive. I also haven't seen any evidence or properly structured research to prove one way or another. The research that has been quoted from what I can see is an analysis of the data contained in the North American Equine Injury Database (EID). Canadian authorities have also claimed that the improvement in fatality statistics is related to changes in withholding times. Do you consider the Flemington or Moone Valley Strathayr courses Turf or artificial?

What is your point? Had nothing to do with the rail. Highview Star was blocked behind a wall of dogs and ran out clipping the back legs of Zipping Angie. Didn't even touch the rail!!! The #3 dog squeezed the #1 dog down to the rail and it got spat out like a pip. A good dog will do that.

I suggest you make a formal apology to the Stewards you have maligned. The dividends are on an API feed from ENTAIN. You don't expect someone to sit there and manually post them on the GRNZ site do you? Note: an API is an acronym of Automatic Programming Interface i.e. a system by which one computer system shares informatiton with another with any manual intervention.

FFS can you learn to copy the youtube link and paste it instead of these random screen shots!! Your posts are getting weirder by the day!

You were at one stage mixing up whole numbers and percentages. You quoted 0.42%. 1.9 per 1000 is 0.19%. The actually overall fatality rate is 0.19% or 1.9 horses per 1000.

Overall they found a fatality rate of 1.9 per 1000 i.e. 0.19%. Which is way higher than the Georgopoulos SP, et. al. Study. The difference between Synthetic and Turf was 0.04% (0.11% vs 0.15%). Or 1 horse in 2,500.

What is the cite?

0.42% of 4,500 is 18.9. I rounded up to 0.5 because it is roughly midway between 0.42% and 0.63%. That's 18.9 not 1.89.

Fake news again @Yankiwi - as the Stewards Report said one of those dogs faltered early well before the lure stopped. As for your other assertions as I've said time and time again you have zero understanding of normative statistics.

Why? A baseless accusation with zero evidence.

So if those 4,500 horses all races on Tapeta there were 22 fatalities? Seems a lot. Of course they would have accounted for the confounding variable that some of those horses would have raced on both Turf and Artificial. Quite frankly, although I haven't seen the raw data, I suspect that the comparisons are somewhat biased and skewed. Doesn't Woodbine claim they have one of the safest turf tracks?

Thinking about it a bit more we got to see more of the horses in the parade ring at Rosehill and Flemington individually than we did for the entire two meetings in NZ. Heard Ron Dufficy and Lizzie Jeffs heaps but didn't see them once.

Now that you mention it that was a pain as well. The Ozzie's do it differently - they have similar preview commentary (stuff all post race unless it's a major event) but is audio not audio AND video from a studio. The "Big Saturday" seems focussed on having attractive women (with leaning heads) and suited men (Thad Taylor must have a dress code exemption) hogging the screen. I'd rather see more horse preliminaries and on screen odds. Also all very fine having the likes of Erin Leighton, and I guess Jayne Ivil will appear soon, looking at horses in the parade ring and giving comments but why not at the time when the horses are actually walking around? With the camera focussed on the horses rather than the presenters?

@curious what does "raceday incidence" mean? 1 in 200 racedays? 1 in 200 races? 1 in 200 imdividual horses? 1 in 200 horse starts?