Chief Stipe

I'm enjoying the camera angles. It feels a lot more exciting to watch the racing a Greymouth than Ellerslie or Riccarton!

A Kevin Myers benefit!

They should be lowering the barriers to entry and lowering compliance costs not raising the bar higher. If there are issues with compliance currently then that is the administrators and an RIB issue not the rules. If they can't manage what they currently do making more rules isn't going to fix that.

None of this will address the key issues - race programming, track quality and safety, race handicapping....those things that help produce a quality product that the punter wants to invest on that then generates stakes. I might add that the amateur hobbyist enthusiast trainer doesn't have a sausage roll warmer.

Hell that's twice in 3 days that I have agreed with you!!!!! Why don't the just address the issues with the current system than just chuck it out and make it tougher for what was once the core of the industry the "little guy"? I'm all for tightening up some of the procedures around ownership etc but that shouldn't involve extra cost or push out some trainers. In the document they contradict themselves often. Another example - "....full-time professional trainers...produce the majority of our starters..." then they say "High performing professional trainers will not have to compete against those who have a lower cost operating model". Ummm aren't the "high performing professional trainers" competing against each other if they provide the majority of starters? These "high performing professional trainers" are very good at passing on ALL costs to Owners and also clipping the ticket on other costs such as pre-training. The presumably "low performing amateur trainer" tends to do all the training. Again I reiterate there is NO mention in the document about horse breakers and pre-trainers - the "high performing professional trainers" get their horses a 3 to 4 weeks before trials and racing and just fine tune.

That's how it reads. My previous post refers to this.

I don't disagree with you however there are some good things in the document. BUT and it is a big BUT there are contradictions and wording that suggest another agenda as you elude to. For example: They say there will be two categories of Trainer licenses - Public and Private. But Private is limited to training for self, family and close relatives. Then they say that "hobbyist and enthusiast trainers have an important place in our sport" yet the above seems to on the face of it preclude that. As the "hobbyist and enthusiast trainer" will have to become a Public Trainer. Why not say if you have 5 or less horses in work for non family/relative and you are a part owner then you can be a Private Trainer?

To be fair @Doomed there is some good stuff amongst the proposals some of which I have advocated for a long time. For example implementation of standards for participation in the industry and the provision of formal training to assist that. The standardisation across the industry of Ownership contracts/agreements. Roger James and Te Akau have been standard setters in that regard for a long time. Hopefully NZTR will be able to monitor these agreements for compliance and avoid the issues that have occurred in the industry. Harness had a very public ownership fraud case recently. They seem to have only two classes of Trainer though - Public and Private. Private only being able to train horses they own or for family or close relatives. Is a cousin a close relative? What about the professional private trainer? I would say that the large Public Trainers are pushing this as there are numerous Trainers that have a small stable of less than 10 in work that don't have to charge for the overheads that the big stables have. What NZTR doesn't realise though is that by making it harder for the small trainer who trains for a small group of non-relatives to operate it will push more horses and owners out of the industry. Once again they have no understanding of what has made this industry in NZ great and they are going to kill it by moving further towards a high cost model. I'm sure many of us know of at least one farmer/trainer who raced horses with some mates and went on to great race wins. Although many of the proposals are things that an active and functional Owner/Trainer Association would be doing. My concerns are further increases to compliance costs within the industry - that money has to come from somewhere either from Owners or the diversion of stake money. Since the TAB pushed a number of functions off their ledger to the codes we have seen the individual code employee numbers rise and their expenditure. Meanwhile they neglect the key driver for the whole industry - safe and available tracks for horses to train and race on.

@Joe Bloggs, @Huey and @nomates you'll either have to relinquish your NZTR licenses or if you haven't got one you won't get one...... One of the rule changes is you are considered undesirable if you have ever been rude to an official of NZ Racing.

Does this mean if I want to be a Trainer I have to go to Roger and Pikie's Tailor to buy a suit and their Optometrist to buy my designer glasses? Kevin Myers didn't sneak into the picture.

I notice one aspect of current training practices that has been "overlooked" and that is the licensing of horse breakers and pre-trainers. Tasks many of the "elite" Trainers don't get involved in.

Can someone upload the document or post q link to where it is available for downloading? Or are the attached documents the ones being discussed? 1 (Dec21) Training and Licensing - Consultation Paper.pdf 2 (Dec21) NZTR Licensing Policy - For Consultation.pdf

I shifted the NZTR Consultation Document discussion to its own Topic.

Except he wants to keep riding but won't be allowed to.

Opie is streets ahead of most of them. Allpress is a kind Jockey and would have had to have been focussed on getting around safe.

Don't have to pay double time plus leave?

The bookies have 4 days off and don't care about Harness. Even if there were special Options you'd struggle to find them using the TAB app.

Not @Brodie's odds $1.15 and $1.01.

Ok I rounded up too much make that 67km/hr - 11 sec 200m.

Have another look at race without the commentary. She did try to glide forward to get one off but each time the horse inside moved with her to keep her out. It wasn't that hard a race on her - a canter and a sprint home.

Good - progress as we are down to one option now. Gone forward and injected some pace into the race and turned it into a true staying competition. Then we would have seen if she was Caulfield Cup material.

I didn't disagree that something is causing the horses to think. But there's a bit of a difference between a horse travelling at 80km/h and seeing a TV image 20m away and looking at a mirror in its stable.

Jockeys Could WA Covid mandates force retirement of Willie Pike? ‘Wizard of the West’ Willie Pike is uncertain about his future in the face of WA Covid mandates. Picture: Nigel Halett By Nicholas Hluchaniuk 07:03pm • 01 January 2022 Comments William Pike was forced to forgo his ride in the Perth Cup on New Year’s Day due to Covid protocols and Western Australia’s leading rider has admitted the requirement to be double vaccinated could result in his premature retirement. Pike has spoken publicly for the first time on his vaccination status in an interview with Freedom Media WA. In the lengthy interview, Pike said there was uncertainty going forward given participants will be required to be double vaccinated come February 5, with those protocols having been enforced for the Perth Cup card at Ascot on New Year’s Day “My future is very uncertain right now. I really don’t know what my future’s going to be like,” Pike said. “I would love to keep riding. I would love to stay on top for as long as I can until one of the young guns come along and boot me off my perch. “I really don’t want to leave it, but under the circumstances right now with the rules and different things in place, it’s getting harder and harder to go out and do my daily job.” Pike has stayed quiet over the past month about his vaccination status as rumours circled. Willie Pike in action on Arcadia Queen winning the 2020 Caulfield Stakes. Picture: George Salpigtidis/Racing Photos via Getty Images He said he was disappointed that media had already run stories on his situation. “The mainstream media has a way of twisting words and leading up to this, I didn’t want to comment, I wanted to make sure I had my story straight and they (the media) went and posted things anyway and I thought that was a bit out of line. “I wanted my story and my reasons told factually. “I didn’t want to get a headline out there that makes some guy in an office get a smug smile on his face.” Pike also expanded on why he was yet to be vaccinated. “I suppose at one point they were touting a digital passport just so you can get into restaurants and whatnot. It‘s how the future’s going to be they say. Well I don’t see how that can be acceptable. You want to go to a restaurant and have a nice meal, why should you have to worry about giving out all your details?” “For me as an athlete as well, health implications definitely have a play in it. The vaccines came around really quickly, how did it get here so quick? I just had questions and it doesn’t feel like we’ve had the time to digest it and take it all on board in an intelligent way.” For the full Willie Pike YouTube interview with Freedom Media WA: WA's TOP Jockey WILLIAM PIKE tells his STORY about missing the 2022 Perth Cup.

Improved from what point? Going back on a slow pace is not an option.

But they cantered the first 7 furlongs and sprinted home.