Doomed

The All Weather meeting at Riccarton this week will be interesting. They have certainly given it every chance to be successful with it being the only industry meeting in Canterbury for 36 days and obviously no Canterbury grass track meeting during that time. You would expect the fields to be massive. Interesting that the Cambridge meeting this week could only manage 7 races, several with smallish fields, and that after lots of horses were balloted out down the road at Matamata a few days ago.

I can't get over how we now have a totally different meaning of the word asset. Back in the day the provincial and country racetracks would have been considered assets as it meant racing could be taken to the masses and had a great spread around the country. Jockeys and trainers could originate from anywhere; and they did, as we all know. Owners could be based anywhere and could follow their horses at the local racemeetings and were happy to travel to watch them race elsewhere. These days if a small town based owner still has a share in a horse it is more likely to be with an Australian trainer. Now in the eyes of that well known quarterwit Sharrock an asset is something that can be sold and any returns sent to the far end of the country to fund racing in Auckland. (I came across that quarterwit expression in the Guardian and couldn't resist using it) Can you imagine if NZ Rugby said to clubs in Eketahuna and Masterton and all other small NZ centres: "We have exciting news for you, we are going to rationalise rugby in NZ and centre everything around the five super rugby teams. So we are going to sell off your grounds, clubrooms, uniforms, rugby balls, and anything else we can get our hands on, and send all the cash to the Blues. You will still be able to be involved as you can watch the games on TV and even travel to Auckland if you wish. The cash from selling your asset (thanks for maintaining it over the years) will help fund a PR position in Auckland for 12 months and a cultural advisor for six months. So your sacrifice will definitely be worthwhile. It is all for the greater good."

Another good piece from Brian de Lore. http://www.theoptimist.co.nz/ Nothing new mind you, and nothing that we haven't been saying on here for ages. It hardly needs an intellectual giant to determine where the racing industry is going wrong. Everyone seems to know what the problems are except for those involved with NZTR, the TAB and a few of the big clubs. All a bit bizarre isn't it?

Virtually full fields all day today at Matamata, many ballots scratched, and on a soft track. Some horses must like the sting out of the ground and have been waiting for wet tracks. Who could have expected that? This type of racing no longer exists in Canterbury. No option for waiting for an industry meeting on a rain affected track. Those Northern trainers don't know how lucky they are. Based on precedent I would have expected all Matamata meetings for the winter months to be moved to Cambridge. I suppose the NZTR brains trust will be doing a ring around and saying: "Well, who could possibly have expected this. Some trainers and horses must like wet tracks, I'll be blowed. Do you think we should introduce wet track racing in Canterbury?" Strange old world.

Ironically of course the big clubs may end up eliminating themselves anyhow. You just know Trentham will cock up this multi million dollar development and go the same way as the Auckland trots.

I have just noticed that there is no grass track meeting anywhere in Canterbury between last week's Riccarton meeting on 7 May and the next Timaru meeting on 12 June. 36 days without a grass track opportunity anywhere. During the same period there are only two AWT meetings as well. How does a trainer justify keeping going, especially if they have horses that don't want AWTs? Gone are the days of horses that like wet tracks waiting until the rains come. I suppose the only option is to send them all to Sydney. I presume they don't want the embarrassment of hundreds of horses nominating for Timaru and having to eliminate many of them. If they are so insistent on AWTs why not alternate between AWT and grass tracks week about? One presumes the same thing will happen once the AWT gets going at Awapuni. I can't understand why trainers tolerate this, obviously some are voting with their feet, but surely some would prefer to remain in Canterbury and take their chances at Timaru and Ashburton. Do I read it quite wrong and are most trainers happy with the regime?

My word Mikey, that is the best thing you have ever written. You should frame it.

Sadly, I suspect they are quite happy to see certain people leaving. It is exactly what they want to achieve. They want to centralise everything on a few favoured tracks with their favoured trainers. Just imagine if one or two of the golden boys decide to leave, that would really put some cats amongst the pidgeons. I certainly have nothing aganst those favoured trainers, but it is a very short sighted approach. Just imagine if the Aussies had said no to Waller, Busuttin and Baker when they tried to move in. I'm sure Queensland is delighted to have Taplin, whereas those that run NZ racing are quite happy to see him go. Strange old world.

I think the managers of any industry where a significant number of major participants suddenly up sticks and leave should be concerned. And people should rightly be entitled to ask said managers whether there was anything they could have done better, and whether they are doing anything to stop others following. The Taplins taking off and Tylers and Dennis winding down is pretty much the equivalent of Te Akau, Marsh and Pike all saying " we're off". At what point does all this start being a concern to NZTR? By the time they get around to selling off Waimate and Wairoa and build another dozen or so AWTs the industry will be virtually stuffed.

I imagine everyone was still so excited coming off the high of the AWT opening. Probably why they forgot to water and came up with a good track as well.

It will be interesting to hear if he has an opinion about the Taplins heading to Oz after their successes today. I seem to recall Bernie's attitude when asked about the Tylers winding down was along the lines of "f..k off, won't be missed." I get the impression that if the Southlanders don't want to move to Riccarton and race on the AWT they are considered irrelevant and can't expect much support going forward.

Early days yet, but so far he doesn't appear to have brought anything new to the job. He obviously enthused them during the interview process. God know what the other candidates were like.

Interesting. Sounds like its a nice to have if you can afford it item and if there is nothing else to spend any money on. Rather ironic I thought to interview Winston in front of the mothballed public grandstand. All the talk referred to it as a training option, no mention of it as a racing surface.

I don't think I can ever recall the Coast racing every second day before. Can't imagine many horses racing at all 3 meetings. Would you put it down to incompetence Reeton, or do you think they are trying to kill off the circuit? They are probably full of enthusiasm now they have seen how successful the AWT has been.

It would be good to hear what the trainers and jockeys thought of the track. Freda's staying maiden stopped a long way out. You would like to think that was because it didn't handle the track.

You could have 6 or 7 of them for the cost of one AWT.

It just looks like an incredible amount of money to spend on something that wasn't needed. Makes the industry look pretty incompetent when you look at its priorities. You do wonder how Marlborough, Banks Pen, Waimate, Timaru etc feel when they look at what they have been scarificed in favour of. I wonder if those clubs consider that their sacrifices were all worthwhile when they see how exciting the racing was today. I wonder what the turnovers looked like compared to Timaru last Thurs. The industry must be saving a hell of a lot of money by abandoning the Timarus to be able to fund today.

Probably, but you still wonder why 23 horses at Timaru get one race and 18 horses at Otaki get 2. You also wonder how the hell they would have had enough horses for both Otaki and Woodville.

I watched a couple of races and the racing seemed to be a bit boring, nothing much seemed to change from the turn: things may have been different in other races of course. Hard to know if the small fields were because of two meetings in the same city in the space of 3 days or because of the AWT. Although that is pretty much what the powers that be want to happen going forward with racing centralised on Riccarton. Provincial Riccarton and City Riccarton of course. When comparing the fields with those at Timaru last week, one thing I found interesting was that one 1,200m race at Timaru had 23 noms. 14 got into the field, 6 were balloted and 3 eliminated. Very interesting comparison with Otaki tomorrow. The 1,200m rating 65 split into two fields of 9. Always seems to be a different policy in that respect for NI and SI. I do wish someone would explain the rationale behind it.

I will be cheering for Pam to win the very first race on the Riccarton AWT. I'm sure it would be very popular with the locals for one of their own to win the first race. I'm sure Tim will be first in the queue to rush out and congratulate her.

Surely this would be more suited to the dogs forum. I have just had the most unsettling image of Gelda impaled on her broom

I think if you were to ask a cross section of SI racing people what the top priorities would be if they had $15m to spend on SI racing, an AWT might struggle to make the top 20. Probably squeezed somewhere between a new tearooms at Winton and a 1,200m chute at Reefton. .

Timaru has a public grandstand, which is a good start.

I think the Alison hung around for quite a while, but seems to have disappeared now.

Yes, that is significant. They have never really latched onto the importance of Timaru being so central and able to attract horses from all over. If an AWT was so important why wasn't it built at Timaru? Its even in the provinces. I'm still bemused that there weren't more comments about the Provincial Growth Fund being used to fund a multi million dollar project in the middle of NZ's second biggest city.