Chief Stipe

Does David Howorth still have his stables there?

Great course - good surface - history - new facilities - yeah na we need to run them round on the poly at palmy!

You don't have race meetings!

Doesn't take much time. I know because I've complained recently through the Ombudsman about something. Doesn't cost either. If it goes higher in the courts then there are a number of up and coming constitution lawyers that will take the case on. I've learnt recently that there are a lot of regulations applied by certain authorities that don't stand up to the law. For a long time I've felt that the term "undesirable" should be tested in Court. Especially when those that use this reason would fail the test.

Wow! I look forward to that Court case! Good luck NZTR selling that one!

Did you complain to a higher authority? Like the Human Rights Commission?

What was the reason given?

That's the key. AWT's are not going to increase revenues as punters don't like them. Especially when it's the same horses running week in week out. If you look at Harness 77 race meetings at Addington for the year is going to kill the punter interest AND the enthusiast. What's the bet that Sunday's meeting on the grass at Methven will cream Friday nights Addington meeting in terms of revenue?

I'll ask again - what would the value of the land that Riccarton is on be worth? Contrary to Pitty's view I'm not negative and delusional I just think that if the industry is going to survive it needs to think outside the square. The current Riccarton site cannot provide a modern training and racing facility that "makes us a world leader"!

Yeah na - they'll just hire Addington's water truck. That aside I notice that Pakenham only allows trackwork between 4-9am each day on the Polytrack. If they have a raceday what will be the watering and grooming rules during the day? Punters nightmare!

It'll be washed away at Awapuni!

Maybe I should up my bet with Pitty.

That was what I thought but I was covering my arse. So that's $300,000 to put away each year!

LOL - Tipene O'Reagan! Reminds me of the time when Tipene turned up to book a room at my Dad's motel. He signed in as Tipene and Dad immediately crossed it out and put Stephen. Gave him a lecture about how his mother was a lovely person and we didn't need this Maori shyte. Sorry to digress.....

I'm not sure......I'm still getting my head around the software update.

I know that this has been discussed before but who owns the land that Riccarton is on?

For the life of me I can't understand why you would close down tracks that pay their way in terms of yearly maintenance. Some are quite creative in doing that - cropping and livestock sales.

In defence of Tim it appears that he is being led down the path by Saundry/NZTR.

I'm not sure if this figure is for just Ballarat or for all tracks under RV's jurisdiction. Even so RV is limiting their polytrack's to only 2 or 3. So if it is 3 then that's $2m every 10 years just to replace the surface. That's AUD$200,000 a year. Add to that yearly running costs then north of NZD$300,000 per year just for the Polytrack at Riccarton is not unreasonable.

I think Tim might a wee bit off with the $65,000 a year. According to RV and the new Ballarat Polytrack..... RV executive general manager for infrastructure and club support Jamie McGuinness said not only would there be an initial outlay of about $8 million to build the track, the industry was committed to spending more than $6m every eight to 10 years to replace the surface of each synthetic track. https://www.thecourier.com.au/story/5245654/synthetic-racetrack-major-gain-for-ballarat/

Thanks Counter Punch for your generosity. I'm happy to manage the scoring for you - from past experience members like to be kept up to date during the day with the scores. That is an onerous task at the best of times and you should be spending your time enjoying what looks like a great day of racing at your home track! The forecast for Methven looks good too!

More from Tim Mills. I think they are very optimistic at $65,000 annual maintenance costs. Mills says if it is over that then it isn't sustainable! The costs to maintain the turf track will remain and will probably increase - we all know that there is an underlying (excuse the pun) issue with the main turf track. “If it’s costing $5,000 a week, which is $250,000 a year, there is no way we can run it. Our information is it will cost between $55,000 and $65,000 a year to maintain, and if you look at what we pay to maintain grass tracks, the plough and sand tracks, it’s not in excess of that figure.

I think Tim Mills is being a bit optimistic regarding maintenance costs - he is excluding daily staff costs as well - there would surely have to be an increase in staff to do things such as track grooming, watering (you need to water a polytrack to get surface consistency relative to temperature), picking up horse dung (polytrack's deteriorate with the addition of organic material): Tim Mills continued, “There are so many different stories about what they cost, and that’s certainly not what the maintenance costs will be. We’re told that if you spread the costs out over a 12-year average with the big projects that have to happen every four years, then it averages out at $55,000 to $65,000 annually.

Quote from De Lore, The Optimist interview with Pitty: Leading South Island and Riccarton trainer Michael Pitman makes no bones about where he stands in the Riccarton Polytrack debate. He says: “No one knows how much it’s going to cost; that’s the thing that annoys me. They have a ballpark figure; it could be as low as $12 or $13 million, but it could be as high as $18 million, but they don’t know until the design plan is finalised. Michael Pitman: I want to see more racing at Riccarton, and I don’t want to travel anymore… “Personally, and I’m looking at this through rose coloured glass. I am based at Riccarton and have my own property at Yaldhurst, and I want to see more racing at Riccarton, and I don’t want to travel anymore because I’m sick of it.” When asked what Michael Pitman would say to the people in Southland who might lose dates and have to travel more, Michael responded, “I agree with that, they probably will have to travel more, but that’s life. “I’m all in favour of the all-weather track,” Michael continued, “and I hate the criticism of the track coming from people who have never seen one in their life. They are not the be-all and end-all; they’re only an aid, and they’ll probably hold only 12 meetings a year on the Riccarton one.