Yankiwi

A very important point I had made in another thread, which doesn't deserve to get buried in there. It's part of the cover-up & deception GRNZ had used in reports to the Govt on how well they were doing in regard to improving animal welfare & outcomes. You heard the following here first. On another note, has anyone noticed how 28-day stand-down stopped being imposed suddenly to dog's that failed to pursue the lure during their race, so they were not charged with the infraction, as they had a "convenient" serios injury? Trainer/vet collusions were having a serious impact on injury data by trying to dodge the rightful penalty from being imposed, that's why. Prior to someone at GRNZ finally working that little detail out, GRNZ was quite happy just letting them slip through (especially if they were on the "preferred trainers" list). That was one key reason why GRNZ was suddenly able to claim how their new strategies were so effective in keeping dogs safe. Maybe 1 every couple of weeks x 52 weeks was 26 serious injuries a year on the books that didn't happen. So, they stopped allowing uninjured dogs being given a 28 day stand down period. Now that they don't have that little ace up their sleeve, things are getting a lot tougher to show improvement on. This racing season the "tougher" is now becoming an impossibility.

https://twitter.com/Jinx_the_future/status/1758361658429235225 Link to data leak, especially for Chief (self-proclaimed forum data expert) https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1BwtabtrYjvSfAKlI3o_OTUlgPN_NrzCXTsPM_QT6gKI/edit#gid=1501875197

https://www.dia.govt.nz/diawebsite.nsf/Files/Racing-Greyhound-Review/$file/Greyhound-Review-Final-Report-12-December-2022.pdf Transfer 18/12/24 to Cambridge GRNZ.

Probably because it's the way it's always been done. One day in Cambridge years ago, I went up the Stewards office to query something. The steward asked me to wait a minute as he was doing the report for the previous race. I waited a couple of minutes for him & then he called me in. Once in & just as he was about to submit that report, he realized that he had inputted the report into the wrong race. He quickly explained what was going on. I gave him an on-the-spot quick lesson with cut & paste. He was very thankful. Now he's a GRNZ board member.

Hey Chief, I'm still waiting for your prediction on the number of dogs that will be injured and which category those injuries will be attributed to at tomorrow's Auckland race meet. Show me how good your normalized, manipulated data can perform by using the trends it would provide. My prediction is highly volatile, as I only used current season data (two race meets) to form my prediction. Surely you can narrow it down much better with a further reaching cross section of your superior data. Don't be shy.

Hint for you in the above question Chief. If a dog gets an injury stand-down of say 21 days after a race. Then 10 days into that stand-down, same dog gets represented to a race day vet, cleared of injury (it healed). Now that dog didn't have an injury in the first place according to GRNZ stats. You heard the following here first. On another note, has anyone noticed how 28-day stand-down stopped being imposed suddenly to dog's that failed to pursue the lure during their race, so they were not charged with the infraction, as they had a "convenient" serios injury? Trainer/vet collusions were having a serious impact on injury data by trying to dodge the rightful penalty from being imposed, that's why. Prior to someone at GRNZ finally working that little detail out, GRNZ was quite happy just letting them slip through (especially if they were on the "preferred trainers" list). That was one key reason why GRNZ was suddenly able to claim how their new strategies were so effective in keeping dogs safe. Maybe 1 every couple of weeks x 52 weeks was 26 serious injuries a year on the books that didn't happen. So they stopped allowing uninjured dogs being given a 28 day stand down period. Now that they don't have that little ace up their sleeve, things are getting a lot tougher to show improvement on. This racing season the "tougher" is now becoming an impossibility.

But if I have crap stats, how are they so well in line with their official stats? Yet I post them nearly 3 months before they do. How does that work?

GRNZ answers your question with its KPI target injury figures. It's their benchmark so that is the comparison point I use for my data. 1 Jan 2024 to current (7 race meetings) Auckland is underperforming (to say it nicely) That's why GRNZ needs a subscription to the exclusive BOAY paywalled pointless presentations forum. Real time data available to them with the click of a mouse, instead of waiting until waiting until 17 July 2024 (roughly) when the release Q3 data and realize there was a serious problem in Auckland in Jan, Feb, Mar & Apr. GRNZ can do something about the danger now, but to identify & announce the problem in July, is dismissive & rather pointless. GRNZ identified that Manukau's lack of a safety rail (no help from me naturally) so set sail to have one installed by the end of November 2023. History repeats, again & again & again. The BOAY pointless presentation paid forum is an easy way out for them, for less than the cost of putting the fourth leg back under one of the 11 Feb 2024 Manukau dogs.

I'll answer if you promise not to show the following data to GRNZ, until they pay the $4K for it. It varies dramatically depending on which track they race on. Early 3rd quarter data says~ Auckland 2.9% per start Christchurch 0.8% per start Wanganui 0.6% per start Palmerston North 0.7% per start Southland immortality Cambridge immortality

Another discrepancy. 22 Oct stewards report.

Here's one of the discrepancies between the Yankiwi/GRNZ Q1 data comparison above. From 17 Sept 2023 stewards report. I suppose changing the diagnosis some 6 weeks or so after the injury occurred helps pad the numbers a bit. Isn't 6 weeks 42 days, or what the stand-down was changed too coincidently? What hasn't Dublin Express either been retired or returned to racing after the miraculous cure? https://www.grnz.co.nz/greyhounds/profiles.aspx?AnimalID=34412 Maybe he's simply waiting for GRNZ to provide him with a safe track to race on up north somewhere?

Ok, where did the image I posted in my above post go? Never mind, here it is again.

Are you ready to subscribe GRNZ? I've finished off the second quarter data from the 2023/2024 racing season. Methinks you're going to have a tough time spinning this in your Q2 report. Hint: Red numbers do not indicate your tracks are ready to begin the 3rd quarter. With a BOAY paywall subscription, you could leave the office at knock-off time, have your dinner & then go to bed and have a peaceful sleep. By the time you wake up in the morning & get to the office you'll have up to the minute injury data so you'll know which tracks are likely safe to let the dogs go around & which ones likely will not be. With the subscription, you would have had the data & the knowledge that Manukau wasn't safe to race on last Sunday and had the chance to move operations over to Cambridge. Failure to do so saw two dogs break a hock. The cost of putting those two dogs through surgery & the aftercare costs at the RTR would probably be in the territory of $10k to $12K in valuable industry funds. It simply makes sense! Buy a subscription from Chief & myself for the low monthly fee of $4k. Use the data to help keep the dogs safe. Use the data to have inside information so you can shift plans on the fly to lessen or completely alleviate the injuries. Use the data to avoid extremely costly medical bills. Disclaimer: No greyhounds were injured during the production of this brief advertisement.

...

I have a plan Chief, let's team up together and make heaps of money. If we do, it could be a win, win, win. GRNZ seems to collect injury data during a racing season 1 Aug 2023 to 31 Oct 2023 (23/24 Q1) while it transpires. Then the regurgitates it over the following nearly three months and releases that data (17 Jan 2024 in this case) in their GRNZ Quarterly Report. As an example, here is what they released in their Q1 report. https://www.grnz.co.nz/Files/Quarterly Reports/GRNZ October 2023 Quarterly Report - FINAL.pdf Major injuries. And then in a separate chart, minor/med injuries. In comparison to the data they have released, here is the data I had collected and posted on BOAY for the same period. Now, let's take just a moment and compare the two data sets. I'll just borrow a line in my spreadsheet & plug in GRNZ's released data. As you can clearly see, the two data sets are not completely identical (probably because I collect data in my free time & near real time while GRNZ has a highly paid team dedicated to tracking the dogs progress back thru time). However, the end result is nearly the same with minimal differences. Over and above GRNZ report, my data provides individual track, region & configuration results. Now proposal. Set up a thread on BOAY and put that thread behind a paywall of $4000.00 a month. I'll discontinue sharing the results of my data set in the open threads and instead, I'll post the data in near real time to the paywalled thread, which after GRNZ has paid the $4k, they'll have access to the data for the entire month. Of that monthly payment of $4k, you will retain $3k of the funds, as operational cost will be solely your burden, and I'll retain $1k for providing my pointless presentation. The win, win, win. You will increase your earning from the website by $3k/month. I will earn $1k/month from dedicating my time to data collection and presenting my pointless presentation. GRNZ will have data available to them within 12 hours, instead of the 12-week timeframe they seem to be utilizing now. With the data available to GRNZ, they could use it to see the clear trends I'm now seeing a full 12 weeks before they are now seeing them. This will enable them to make far quicker reactions in ensuring the dogs welfare, which underpins everything they do. If "underpins everything they do" is merely a slogan as I have previously suggested, it still makes business sense to sign up for the $4k an month spend, if the information leads to saving them the estimated veterinary cost of one hock surgery operation costing $4k to $5K (2014 rough estimate I had received in the vet room at Manukau with Caesar Legend) just to get him up walking again on all four, if it was successful and after a long painful recover period. So, if GRNZ is serious about welfare, they'll pay. If GRNZ considers welfare an unfortunate obstacle and operate in a bottom-line dollar and cents arena, they'll pay. Let's do this! I'll even lets you call my data worthless (like you do now), all the way to the bank.

Up to 74 dogs going to roll the dice on Sunday in Auckland. https://www.grnz.co.nz/Files/RaceBooks/nzgra_15798_racebook.pdf Met service is predicting a red weather warning for those dogs. If 74 dogs do indeed start and factoring in current season data, expect 4.6 injuries requiring a stand-down. 2.5 of those injuries will be minor/med and 2.1 of those injuries will be major. So, with rounding, expect 5 stand-down injuries, 3 of which will be minor/med and 2 to be major. Let's check back on Sunday night and see how well real-world pointless data performs. Maybe Chief can make his prediction too, with his far superior data analytics. Bragging rights are up for grabs.

Currently the safest track in the country. It would make a great place to learn the trade if their current curator was to play a key part in the training. However, it's the wrong island for me, so I'll have to give it a miss. However, here's an idea. Shut down Manukau, transfer their curator/curators down south for a year's worth training (well away from whoever they are getting their instructions from now) on a track that knows how to get the surface right. Transfer all racing to Cambridge. Completely overhaul Manukau and slow the track down. Once Manukau is back up & ready to return to action, with either their 2014 or 2023 safety rail in place, bring the curators back & make the track a long-term success story.

Current up to date 2023/2024 season data (realized) at the end of yesterday. Ok, I'll manipulate the data (temporarily) to make a point. Imagine GRNZ shut down Auckland and transferred all racing operations to Cambridge since the beginning of the 2023/2024 season on 1 Aug. I've taken all Auckland's starts and added them to the existing Cambridge starts. Then I've increased the existing injuries to the original Cambridge data, so their injury percentages equaled what they were originally. Suddenly it makes the overall season much closer to the GRNZ KPI target & could be possible to achieve it when the weather changes more towards winter & the track become historically safer. Suddenly overall injuries are nearly (0.1% over) within the KPI. Minor/Medium injuries match the KPI. Major injuries are nearly (0.1% over) within the KPI. Moving this seasons Auckland's race meets to Cambridge could have made the racing season a safe season by GRNZ standards. With no racing in Auckland it would give the opportunity to fix the track, similar to what they've done in Wanganui by using PN. Water under the bridge. GRNZ has failed again. Back to reality. Ouch...

I don't need to manipulate the data. The RIU & RIB have done plenty of manipulation already in their Stewards reports. If I didn't care about the industry, the data as it was reported is far bad enough (especially with the Auckland track in recent years) to turn the light switch off unless GRNZ plugs the leaks in the sinking ship very soon. But I do care about the industry. I've spent numerous hours of collecting data from over many years of censored, confusing and deceptive Stewards reports. That's why I didn't record any dogs that "received a leg injury" yet didn't receive an injury stand-down. I know what it meant, I have a picture of one of them on my lounge wall. Besides, anyone with a slight bit of knowledge of the industry knew what it meant. I did not record incidents such as those as an injury. It's not in the industry's best interest if I had. They tried to hide it, but that tactic didn't stack up well when the do-gooders asked where 100's of unaccounted-for dogs were & they had no answer. That was one of GRNZ's major failings, not the straightforward data, free for anyone to collect, I've taken the time to collect & share.

Hinsdale greyhound track 1973 to 2008 or 35 years. Closed due to serious financial pressures. https://www.reformer.com/local-news/end-of-an-era-hinsdale-racetrack-being-demolished/article_068c2054-e2e4-53c1-a34d-eee0cd2cc74b.html Manukau greyhound track 1989 to 2024. or 35 years. Open due to normalizing track safety data.

Hinsdale was a safe two turn track. Get the track composition & surface correct. Everything else will settle nicely into place. Notice the much more gradual entry into the corners are at Manukau compared to Hinsdale. Hinsdale front & back stretch are much longer and there is less distance through the infield between them. The corners are on a much tighter radius. A slower surface and tighter corners made the dogs go slower going into & through the turns. Because of the camera angles, Hinsdale's backstretch is on the bottom of its photo while the Manukau image has the the backstretch at the top of its image.

My results. Well, I see why you like variance so much. What a difference it makes. It almost makes you wonder why they have a vet at the track on a race day. After applying a sample variance to the three different tracks, it has changed everything. Ok, I'll man up & admit, I was wrong. My apologies for far over-stating the past documented injuries to greyhounds by the RIU/RIB. All this time I believed that if a dog got injured, it got injured. I've now been enlightened, reborn, can see the errors in my former ways. After applying a sample variance to the data I had collected, I'm not really sure how many greyhounds were injured during the 2017/18 Q2 racing season, but the combined injury percentage is well below GRNZ's KPI targets. Wow! Well done to GRNZ. Well done AGRC. Well done WGRC. Well done CGRC. Results such as these bring back some fond memories from my time spent in Hinsdale. I should also add that anyone contemplating whether they should race their dogs on Sunday in Auckland, don't worry. You don't need to be concerned. This new data set nearly proves that the track will be safe, regardless of its past history & my biased prediction.

My cynical side decided to dig a bit further into this "well performing" quarter. Did Auckland really overachieve and produce a safe track for three months? The data clearly shows it did, so I wanted to find some other point of comparison. With that, brief study #6 has been completed. I've gathered the data from the other two turn tracks for the same period. Wanganui and its "potholes" & Christchurch and its "wall of death". It returned some very interesting results! All three tracks returned very good results (In GRNZ benchmarks). Was it that all 3 tracks had luck going their way? Did all three different track curators overperform during the same three-month period? Were there very favourable weather conditions over the three-month period covering most of the country? Were there multiple Stewards/Veterinarians working from some new playbook meant to make the numbers look good or appear better than the reality? There will be endless possibilities so you can make up some of your own if you wish. Since the JCA/RIB can consider a case to be provable where more evidence is tilting one way more than the others, you can be the judge to decide for yourself which is the most likely. As for me, I smell a rat. This is what tipped my balance of probabilities. Since when does a fracture of anything get a 28-day standdown? The dog returned to racing 3 months later.

2014 & the GRNZ board/headquarters methodology which proves they were not fit for purpose. Aussie track expert had suggest twisting the PN 375m boxes a bit & running the lure out to 10m will make for safer racing there. What did GRNZ do? Lure Driving Trial GRNZ in conjunction with some of the clubs recently invited Brian Barrington, a noted Australian track engineer with over 40 years’ experience in the industry, to visit our busiest race tracks to look at track preparation and racing and share any ideas on how the racing surfaces may be improved to ensure they race consistently and safely through all weathers. Brian visited Wanganui, Auckland and Christchurch tracks and shared many ideas and recommendations to assist track curators at those tracks. During Brian’s visit he was of the opinion that from time to time the lure was placed too close to the lead dog causing the field to bunch up, particularly around the turn and recommended that the lure distance from the lead dog be extended. He said several Australia tracks had trialled this with considerable success in improving the racing and reducing racing injuries. Accordingly the Wanganui Club with the assistance of the RIU will trial the Lure at a distance of 8-10 metres in front of the lead dog from Wednesday May 14th for a period of one month, RIU and club personnel along with GRNZ Welfare Manager Greg Kerr will be monitoring the trial. Then GRNZ claimed this in their 2022 annual report. Whilst there was no documentation to explain why these recommendations were not carried out, it provided reasoning that a safe 375m start could be created. Construction work commenced, the Rules were amended to allow a 10m lure and trials were successfully run from the new start, allowing racing to commence from April 2022. Yes folks, GRNZ collaborated with the WGRC & the RIU to test the theory of a 10m lure to make for safer racing in Palmerston North, which is a horseshoe track, with a one-month trial on the Wanganui track. Many of the dogs running from the unsafe 375m boxes at PN also ran regularly from the 305m boxes in Wanganui. So, we'll trial the theory on the Wanganui track to ensure added safety at the PN track. Wanganui. Palmerston North. Maybe if they weren't busy patting themselves on the back, they would have thought a bit more about what effect the 10m rule would have had on the other two northern & three southern tracks. They might have even tested the three southern tracks to find out what would occur in Auckland.

John, you're down the Chch way. How about popping over to the Evans facility and asking Goldstar Hans what went wrong?