Doomed

Tony must have started in the early 80s so must have been going for about 40 years.

I was amazed when I heard that derby winner had cost $500,000. He has now broken even, but only one horse a year can get that amount back in NZ, other than a sweepstake horse.

I think I heard them say on trackside just before the race she was paying $1.40, which seemed incredibly short. I didn't look myself as I didn't think it was much of a betting race, but I presume they were right. That's getting down to Winx type money. When you look at Derby winners over the years they can often be a rough lot that win. Very gracious remarks from the trainer of the runner up after the race. Showed a lot of class. I did think it was a bit sad that big trackside team trying to hype up what was in all honesty a pretty ordinary day's racing, with smallish fields in most races considering the stakes. In many ways Wingatui was a much more interesting days racing without the full trackside team and all the hype.

If I may interupt just briefly to offer a different perspective. And I admit I stopped reading the above after the first four messages. Sure the initial barrier draw is purely luck, but once it is known it becomes a measurable variable. Barrier draws are very important on many tracks. In a sprint race at Doomben for instance if I don't like anything in particular and if there is some value in those drawn inside I will just box the four inside draws in a quinella. I am not including heavy tracks here. Caulfield is another track where barrier draws become important once the track bias is known. To suggest it is irrelevant considering the numerous variables in determining the outcome of any race is quite farcial to be honest. The Chosen One looked as close as you could get to a weight certainty in that mile at Trentham recently. Some horses will not handle certain track conditions based on breeding and previous performance, others won't cope with some distances for the same reason. Even the odds can be a relevant variable. There are an awful lot of false favourites out there and people who only back favourites get sucked in badly quite regularly. As a punter of course I should be grateful that there are others out there who don't consider any of these variables in making their bets; long may they continue punting.

What's the story with the commentators at Auckland. I see the southland chap did the first (and did a good job) and now another chap calls the 2nd.

I was being a bit sarcastic. I was describing the pick 6, which I presume has been scrapped. I don't recall seeing it mentioned for a while.

Surely the big question now is do you keep spending massive money (which I don't imagine the industry possesses) on a totally suspect track that the industry doesn't even own or cut the losses and close it down. There is a multi million AWT track being built down the road so surely the industry can't afford to spend millions on repairing a provincial track. When you look at the unwanted tracks like Timaru, Oamaru, Hawera and Foxton and compare them to some of the favoured tracks and their performance and history you do wonder what sort of leadership we have. And to repeat what I have said before, that Messara report doesn't have a great record so far with the tracks it favoured.

What about an off course bet type where you have to select the last six winners at a given meeting and it jackpots if not struck?

Bloody hell! I certainly didn't expect to see this when I checked on here. Words fail me really. This is one of the golden child favoured tracks. They get more special subsidies for weird races than any other club. The local council wants the land, why not just give it to them for a golden handshake. Get enough money to tidy up Hawera and start again. All the money spent on massive salaries for failed ex cops. Surely what is needed is some money spent on turf experts. I see the listed race is having a third go at getting off the ground. Different direction and different distance this time.

I don't think you could win a million or more in those.

That was 50 years ago. There was no such thing as lotto then, and no big off course pools, and no way to watch races unless you were on course. It wouldn't work these days.

Thank god for the top weight. The owners of Concert Hall could just about ask for an appearance fee to make an appearance at any meeting with a suspect group race.

Probably fair.

There would be no interest these days. On course crowds are far too small to get anything like that moving. It would probably only grow by $2,000 to $4,000 per meeting in the early days. On course turnover is about 5 times smaller at most meetings than it used to be. Taking inflation into account it should obviously be much bigger than it used to be. You have to remember in the days of the on course jackpots there were no big off course pools. No trifectas, first fours etc.

They did start with big fields, still about 10 left in most races. Trainers just don't like racing in big fields and because they have so many opportunities they can just pick and choose.

I bet most clubs in NZ would love to have a track like Corbould Park.

Interesting one. Went from looking the possible winner at the 200m, to running 5th. Tough life for jockeys: don't hit them hard and often enough and get into trouble for not riding them out, hit them too hard and often and get into trouble for that as well. Consistency is all we ask for.

I think you will find Joh came from Dannevirke.

Interesting day on the punt for harness punters. Winners paying $1.10. $1.10, $1.20, $1.40 and $101. Not much there for us normal punters.

To be fair, the racing articles on the website are actually some of the best things they do. They are generally well written and usually relevant and interesting.

Was it intentionally designed to be only 6 races, trying to copy the Karaka thing? Seems high risk when many of the races aren't betting options.

Certainly an eclectic bunch of slot holders. Good luck to them all. It will be interesting to see how it works out. I presume no crowds will be allowed and I think it is outside the Government's time slot to reimburse organisers of failed events.

Someone liked that comment, but I couldn't understand a word of it.

I thought it already was.

While we are being critical of Auckland we should also note that Addington Friday is not a lot better. 5 and 6 horse fields for $20,000 and only 8 in the $17,500 race for horses coming through the grades. I can never understand where the horses disappear to in the trots. They run so many maidens and 1 to 2 win races (I don't understand their strange rating system where winners can be rated lower than maidens and run for lower stakes) and then the winners seem to disappear and they never have enough horses for 4,5,6 win type races.