the galah

Well are you there to try,or there to give it a quiet run? It was a group 1 after all. Dunns drive was more negative than williamson. When Tim Williams moved up on Spankem,you could see he waited for dunn to move out on henry hubert. Why did he do that,well obviously because thats what williams would have done had he been driving henry hubert. Williams clearly had not expected Dunn to be so negative. Still we can analyse any race i suppose,just this one easier with its small numbers and good drivers having a pre race mindset which resulted in their negative tactical decisions.

The premier racing which has small fields dominated by 2 or 3 stables isn't that exciting to watch. Its always good to see a good horse run in the flesh,but when watching them on tv it does little to raise the excitement levels if the races are meekly handed to the better horses. I don't know whether purdon/rasmussen have too much to do the cullen stable. Obviously purdon still does a little. But whatever the reason for Rasmussen cutting back on involvement,she's still their number 1 asset as far as the driving goes. Personally i think they should have more 2600m races,as the 1980 races are too much of the same thing.

Yes,dunn on henry hubert also gave his horse no chance. Electing to sit 4 back the fence,knowing it was turning into a sprint home,meant he too had decided he was just there to make up the numbers.

I agree that the bigger the field the harder it is for those off handicaps. But if you look at the official times,Williamson ran the 800m between the 2800m and 2000m in 1.02.7. That made it easy for those off the handicaps to make up the ground without over exerting themselves. Then,it was his choice to stay 3 back the fence and effectively box himself in,knowing the likely outcome was he would get out too late. I say he did this because he thought the others were better than him,and despite it being a group 1,$90,000 race,he didn't want to over tax his horse. Well his thinking may be fair enough,but that tactical negativity by under driving his horse got the result it deserved and will be noted by his future opponents. As i have said before,i don't think the cullen trained horses currently have the "run forever' factor. They get tired just like any other horse. They are well trained but they are beatable, just like all the rest. As to AG'S whitesocks. The Hopes are very good trainers,but this horse has not won when trained in canterbury for 2 years. He had a form reversal and won when trained by barry purdon at the interdominions and won in australia about 18 months ago,but apart from that has only managed to run 2 placings in races that only had 5 and 6 runners in the last 2 years. One thing you can always bank on with him as well is 90% of the time he breaks in stands. He really needs to race in mobiles and not against the horses he ran against last night to get back to winning form.

The Cullen stable drivers simply out drove the others. The best of the opposition was pembrooks playboy. Nathan williamson ,normally a top driver,seemed to be in awe of the cullen horses and really gave away the advantage he had with the 20m start by showing early in the race he would take a trail,then seemed happy to become boxed in over the last lap. So all in all,a very tame race . As to ricky may having balls the week before. Well he refused to give the lead when it looked likely that self assured when keep the lead due to the others settling back,and effectively May ruined his own chances. So really the drivers of the opposition to the cullen trained horses simply made poor tactical decisions for the second week in a row in my opinion.

Yes,a jumps race with 5 runners took preference for trackside. You can't tell me that aussie race had more nz money bet on it than the addington race. It was an incompetent decision by someone in trackside.

Race 1 they had no lead in whatsoever,crossing over as they lined up? Are those who run trackside aware they have a meeting being run. I've always said some of those employed at trackside couldn't care less whether they cover harness racing. Race 1 just more proof of that.

Fair enough. He can be rather one dimensional when driving pacers though. He drives for luck over the last 600m on 90 % of the Hope trained pacers. Thats why he can be a frustrating driver for punters sometimes. And to me he drives the pacers too much stop/start,whereas he rates the trotters at a more consistent speed,like the good drivers do. No ones perfect,but punters just want the driver of the horse they have their money on, to drive them like blair orange or john dunn would everytime.

I should say i recognise that the horse is a sit/sprinter and thats why he drives it for luck all the time. Ben hope driving doesn't put me off backing a horse,but i do think he drives trotters better,and is a bit too one dimensional with his tactics when driving the pacers. Thats just my opinion.

I think this topic a bit stupid. I've backed homebush Lad about its last 7 or 8 starts.Did so again today because its got relief in the handicap due to its rating dropping, because it seems to be forever getting the wrong run. You've picked the wrong horse to highlight if you go back through its recent races. Well done to ben hope today,he had luck go his way,but you can't be serious to call it a brilliant drive where he ends up 6 back the fence and only gets a run because the others got tired because of the pace of the race.

I agree with your assessment.I think mark purdon was right to think Ricky May would be better off taking a trail and therefore would,and in the end ricky mays tactics worked against both horses. Made for an exciting race given it was a 5 horse field. The Dolan trained Watch me now,who beat amazing dream last time was a major flop,finishing a distant last. The dolan stable has been underperforming in the last few weeks,so that was no real surprise. May need to go back to The ellis/barclay stable if it is to produce the odd exceptional performance again.

It always seems like he is talking through his pocket,and lets that cloud his judgment. Its easy enough to do. I'm not supporting his opinion on this occasion. Just getting inside his head,although thats probably not the best place to be sometimes. He may benefit from a bit of time on the couch occasionally , but unfortunately when he needs it,he can't afford it because he has done his dough because of the all stars. Always the way,not just for forbs.

No team driving in that race,but the problem is,and always will be,is they have team driven many times in the past. So when Have A Go posts something like this,i can understand why he has a pre conceived perception that team driven happens.

I was referring to the port at timaru which is partially blamed for its poor air quality. You can get a wallaby pie in waimate.

You get the summer breezes during the hot summer days. Land heats up quicker than water,over summer the warm air over the land rises,and the cool air from the ocean comes in and replaces the warm rising air. At least thats how i think it works. Besides you hardly get much of a sea breeze at night,and night time is when people heat their houses especially in winter. Port activity can be a factor in air quality,and of course so are industrialised areas.

Love the humour

Rotorua used to be one of the worst in nz for air quality,not sure what its like now days. Washdyke in timaru probably the worst in nz if you go by days over a certain high risk level. Waimate had very close to the worst air yesterday in nz,but it varies a bit depending on the weather..Apparently experts say they see many more paitients % wise with lung cancer from the places with poor air quality. You refer to the "cool crisp air" of the south island,but air quality over winter is normally worse in the cooler places with population bases. The floods over in aussie look rather devastating for those effected.

He just has some differing opinions and ways of expressing them to most,and cops a bit of flak for that. I'm not sure what happens on social media platforms,but people do seem to like mocking him for some reason,which is often over the top. A few years ago I thought about moving to Waimate. It is a nice wee town of about 8000 people. On the negative side it is a town that often has poor air quality and higher nitrate levels in the water.Just up the road Timaru used to have the worst air quality in oceania and it still has poor air quality. I once lived in oamaru and there was always a lot of waimate jokes. Can't repeat most of them but generally you were told to come home before they locked the gates at night and not to drink the water.

Ok,didn't get that originally. Finally we agree on something.

Well leonne jones was formally in partnership with peter jones as trainers. Husband and wife. Cam jones is her son. Cam jones uses peter jones colours. 2 plus 2 =4 to me. Whats it to you.

Media have reported he's the son of leonne jones,married to peter jones.

Well it looked quite simple. Archman suffered interference which caused it to break,and Lamb got it wrong by not calling a false start.

One of the biggest draw backs for many is accessibility to affordable training facilities. The back bone of the industry in places like canterbury and southland has traditionally been the small time trainer,and it has often been through the small time trainer that the path to greater participation has been fostered for so many owners/ trainers or employees,all to the benefit of the industry as a whole. In places like auckland accessiblilty to training facilities must be even worse. Land used to be more reasonably affordable, but dairying has killed affordability for horse trainers,even for non irrigated land. For example. If you want to set up a training facility and buy 10 hectares of bare land,anywhere in canterbury will cost a minimum of $400,000,with some land in areas closer to population bases costing much more. Then by the time you put in a track,build a dozen stables with gear shed,power,water troughs,fencing etc you are looking probably all up about $600,000. Now who in their right mind is going to think that is a realistic goal,unless they have a wealthy family benefactor. There are so many variables to such an investment that makes viability near to impossible. Banks aren't going to lend money for that either. So what is the industry leadership doing. Well nothing. Its like they know its there,but its in the too hard basket. As i have said earlier,there isn't even a registry to link people looking for training facilities to use,with those that have them which are no longer used. This issue obviously needs addressed. It will only get worse without action.But no one seems to do anything.

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