the galah

yes, seems you are right with it being at the top of the north canterbury region when i checked the map. canterbury provides most horses in the nelson/west coast regions as well,so the point i was making was there seems to be a deliberate policy to run lower stakes at methven on the date in question and it happens each year. So to me thats treating those who race at methven unfairly, as they will be the same people and horses who support that club throughout the year. Why should the stake for a non win race at a financially sound club like methven in november, be worth less $2000 less than winning a similar race at other country clubs. Methven will be receiving the appropriate funding to run the higher stake would they not. who is behind that decision. Methven or hrnz.if hrnz want it that way,then why can'tmethven stand up for the people and horses that support them regularly and say in the interests of fairness,we want to pay the appropriate stake.

I see that weekend the only canterbury club with a race meeting is Methven. I know its a meeting in which the highest rated horses starting will all be non win first start horses,given the rating system,but why do they run for only $10,000 stakes. Is it the methven clubs decision to pay out the smaller stakes ,knowing they have no compettion in canterbury and take advantage of that fact and save a few $ at the expense of the horses competing. Or is it a hrnz directive to take advantage of the owners lack of choice in canterbury? Aren't methven supposed to be funded more than that by hrnz for their stakes,so why run them for less. this isn't an attack on methven,clearly they are a very good club doing there best to cater for the cross section of industry participants. And that meetings stakes are low every year. Methven after all are supposed to be a well off club ,so should be able to at least be expected to support owners by paying what hrnz said they were funding clubs.

I've explained before why i think its obvious the most important factor in turnover,above all else on any nz harness race, is the timeslots allocated and the pre race coverage on the main australian sky racing channel. Last night yet again proved what i say to be accurate. Addington ran 13 races,but tabcorop,who control the sky racing coverage only had betting on the first 12. I'm not sure whether that is a software thing with them,that they can only go up to 12 races. But because they had no sky australian coverage of the last race,the betting on that race on tabcorp was obviously non existant race and the betting on the nz/entain pool,which of course included the australian states that commingled with the nz pools,well the nz tote pools on the last race were rather abysmal.. The aussies betting into the nz commingled pools wouldn't have even got to see the final leg of the quaddie/treble. now last night ,for some reason,1 addington race half way through the card had a larger gap of 5 minutes until it being next race to go,with the preceding race being an australian trot race starting 5 minutes before addington.And what happened because of the extra lead in time,well both the nz pools and the tabcorp pools were double what you get even on the normal 3 race minute gap. And 5 times the size of many of the races that had only a 1 minute timeslot gap,especially the aussie tabcorp pools. So what should HRNZ together with entain be doing to generate a big turnover race. doesn't it seem obvious? what is the other thing that attracts large scale betting pools.... answer jackpotting first 4's. So what i suggest they do is take 10% out of every first 4 that jackpots throughout the week on nz harness races and put that money each week into the race at addington with the best pre race coverage timeslot(generally occurs around the 4-6p.m. australian timeframe). It has to be primarily jackpotting first 4 funded,not guaranteed first 4,because its the jackpotting pools that ensure a better than normal % payout. Sure they can do a guaranteed pool,but the jackpotting part is important for punters returns. some weeks you may only get jackpotting pools of $10,000 being injected,but on a week like when methven had their big pools you could start off with a jackpotted pool of up to $50,000. The aussies love to bet into those jackpotting pools and just imagine what they would do on a race with decent pre race exposure time on sky racing. closing pools similar or higher to the hige methven pool wouid be generated. its all about the timeslot andcombining that with a pool that has good jackpotting money in it. It would only be a one off each and they would need to have the pool size on the trackside screen. Its a guaranteed way of increasing turnover. They could do the same on a firday night with one trifecta race at auckland on the race with their best timeslot.

a mistake for sure,but i think in reality if you were a punter you would be being unrealistic if you thought the small difference in starting distance should have meant they didn't confirm the result. In my opinion,the common sense decision was made when they confirmedit. No big deal in the whole scheme of things.

thanks gammalite. it always is a nice feeling tipping and backing a winner.

as expected benson dude given the perfect trip by olivia thornley and got the result expected. Amazingly paid $23 on the ff near the end. almost double what i backed it at when i thought i was getting overs. The driver change a big swing in its favour today,especially if you had been watching how it was driven recently. The only thing i found frustrating was all afternoon i couldn't have a bet on the junior drivers market as it was suspended.So didn't back her win or place on that, like i intended.still i'm happy.

who are people picking to win this. the tab did have a market open but they have suspended that at the moment. Maybe they are just waiting to see which horses are allocated to which driver for the final heat on friday at addington. looks a very even spread of chances at this stage. Maybe olivia thornley may be in with a chance. shes got no standout drives and actually has no drive at all in one race but she drives benson dude in the first heat tonight and hes drawn 1 which always helps. Its not been the horses fault its form looks just average. A better driver on tonight and should get a better result if it can keep a lead or leaders back position. The higher rated caufiled seems to have snuck into that race off the ballott but it seems an even field.

Night watch sold for $4,500. I guess williamson being honest and advising that the horse has bled in the past has meant the 5 year old mare sold for less. he did also state she was a competotive racehorse,so he must think she still will be just that and i'm sure if anyone rung him he would be totally honest with any questions asked. K tomlinson on trackside said she goes best with more than 1 week between races so i guess thats to do with the bleeding issue she has to be treated for,but this is a horse who has earned just under $40,000 this season. actually the bleeding thing is interesting. I read a lot of studies about it once.The data showed that it was to do with intense training and racing, how much a horse had had in its career. The studies also said it seemed to happen more in colder temparatures which makes sense and it was suspected air pollution may be a factor,but that was unproven. in my opinion,i've always believed its caused sometimes by drivers over extending their horses when they are beaten. In other words, they are tired with 400m to go because they have been overdriven early in a race,but because they are in with a chance occasionally you see drivers keep at them . I think some horses try so hard and they pay the price for an unnecessarily over taxing drive.I can name many examples of tha over the years. In fact theres a couple of horses going around at the moment i suspect have had that happen to them and you can see it in their form. thats why i say,the worst thing any driver can do is chase the field when they have lost too much ground at the start,to be any realistic chance of placing.

Invercargill sunday. who in their right mind is going to go to a race meeting when they have to sit around for so long just waiting in the car or sitting in the grandstand,waiting mostly 40 minutes for the next race.Imagine it on a day when it was clod. the gaps on sunday at invercargill are 25,25,31,41,40,40,40,42 and 29. If someone owns a horse they may turn up and watch their horse race and then go home,but who else apart from the trainers and drivers,who have no choice,is going to turn up. i find the gaps too long even sitting at home when i can fill in my time with doing something. i remember all the talk not that long ago abouthow everyone believed gaps of even 35 minutes were too long. Seems thats gone out the window. this week the gallops have no meetings on monday,tuesday or thursday. They have 2 sunday meetings for this week. Surely they must be thinking the same,as afterall the gallops have even less to look at between races. much of what happens in makes little sense these days.

just wondering when the canterbury clubs are going to be running the finals of their high stake races that HRNZ have given aucklnad the funds to run,like the above races. Why haven't they promoted the canterbury races? also,when are the penalty free finals for the horses than run at the low grade addington wednesday meetings,like cambridge had. maybe its all being kept a bit hush,hush as they dont want to stop all those canterbury horses, that are racing at auckland each week at the moment.Not that i can think of even 1 horse that has. Or is it the case,that hrnz only reward clubs and the provinces that provide a product that can generate losses? Surely canterbury trainers/owners,clubs can't be that apathetic. or maybe they are.

I'm sure over the years you've almost perfected the art of replies to others, which can be both nicely balanced with undermining yet complimentary words,to get your point across. I'm sure that skill has served you well. On this topic i've used your words to illustrate you got that balance wrong.You overdid the undermining thing,to the point it prompted a response from me pointing that out and i gave the reason why you got the balance wrong. You say you've complemented my posts in the past,as if that context is supposed to mean something to me. Thats a tad condescending,and you know that. Your doing the ....let me think i'm clever..thing again that i referred to earlier.i don't post anything looking for complements. As to me passing off opinions as facts. You need to read what i say. I would have thought when i say "in my opinion" over and over,you would take it to mean i'm expressing an opinion. I had thought that was very self explanatory.No hidden meaning there. enjoy your night out tonight. Maybe when you have a spare minute tonight,go count the number of people in the stand i referred to on the topic you said my comments gave you a laugh,if it still exists.Will there even be 1? let me know.And don't include yourself in the total.

Your words in this thread tell a different story. I just re read what you have said.here are some of your comments just to remind you. "Lay off him! knocking him(mr clark) every which way. contrary to what is spewed out on here . your quite prepared to join a thread that was only going to get more negative with derogatory comments about a good honest couple of grass root battlers. your like the rooster who thought the sun had risen to hear him crow(i did like that one) add fuel to mr galahs fire some of your posts are good for my insomnia,puts me out fast if the muppet pair were comparing your overall posts with steak,they would call them medium and not very well done. now that was funny( reference to my my expressing an opinion) The use of capitals,i assume because you were saying duh. LONGEVITY(3 times),WRONG" so thats what you have said. Now tabforever,you saying you weren't irritated by me isn't true. I know it and you know it. I don't know what the big deal is that you have to deny that to be the case.After all it is no big deal. You remind me of someone who most likely at some time has been in a position where you have been part of committes or perhaps in jobs where you were part of the decision making. And when someone comes up with an idea or someone makes a comment and you have been asked at a meeting or a staff meeting,what do you think tabforever,you would reply great idea ,thats something we shall give a lot of thought to,keep up the good work. Then when you walk out of the room,with your fellow committee members or management group,probably those in the same circle who you like to hang out with,one will say, did you really think that was a good idea tabforever. And you would reply,no the guys a twat,his ideas were stupid but best to let him think hes clever. So the person whos ideas you just degraded would in time come to realise he was just just given the brush off,that he wasn't being taken seriously and that he had been told just words for appearances sake. anyway,your assumptions that i have a lack of knowledge on whats been discussed in this current topic, well your way off the mark on this occassion.

If what i suggested didn't work, then why do all the australian gallops meetings that get 3 o4 minutes lead in time do it. australian gallops set the gold standard for lead in content in my opinion. For example i sometimes have a bet at the morphetville races on a saturday. The reason i do, is i listen to the 2 informative presenters and they are able to go through the whole field within a couple of minutes. they don't have the times to show each horse as its being commented on like say rosehill,but they also don't have their tv cameras focused just on a handful of horses and eventually you get to see them all,often when being loaded. The vast majority of casual punters bet in the last couple of minutes. Brodie,you may have made up your mind sometime beforehand,but your not a casual punter and its the casual punter,who if given pre race exposure,will make the difference between an average race turnover to a good race turnover. Thats obvious if you watchhow tote turnovers increase and prices fluctuate when a race is given pre race exposure in australia. You have to tick the boxes that encourage everyone to invest,not just those who have good knowledge of form. as to punters getting talked into something pre race. again,if you follow the money,they do. I posted a couple of years ago the impact matt cross had on tote and ff prices one sunday at rangiora,by giving his selections in the last minute. at that point the tab website had it so you could analyse the price fluctuations. That day at rangiora his selections prices dropped between 30-40% on average for the whole card, from when he gave his selections out. That was a day without a presenter on course. and i think everyone that presents a horse to race should get a least a brief mention as every horses connections have people viewing the race for that reason.

And of course i should have said a significant reason i post is i like to hear what other people are thinking on the topics i post on. Everyones opinions are interesting given the subject matter is something i have a keen interest in. i always think people are much more likely to say what they are thinking on a forum like this than they are to your face. too often people in real life will agree with someone when they don't in fact. I much prefer people expressing their real opinions.I'm someone who will always say what i think if asked so a forum like this with true opinions suits.

giving an opinion different to yours is not knocking someone,Its just having a different opinion. and you seem to be picking parts of some replies from people and inferring negativity is the overall tone of those replies,when thats not the case if you apply context. however,I did like when you compared me earlier,to a rooster who likes to hear himself crow when the sun shines. The reason i most liked that you made that comment about me ,was because it confirmed how i thought you perceived me.I don't know,that sort of amused me that you showed that,and it was a colourful way of you putting it as well. i can tell some of my replies agigtate you just a little. some of my posts seem to do that to people sometimes.i have the same effect on the chief sometimes. i think people who i aggitate with what i say, it gradually builds and then they just express what they think and let off a bit of steam when replying. I've seen the same pattern before on here. I have long before this thread,given thought to why i contribute to bit of a yarn,and wanting to hear my own voice is not significant,but would be a factor,but then again so is anyone who makes comments on any forum,including yourself. i believe its a mixture of having a lot of spare time,boredom,being a bit isolated and finding this a forum with people of similar interests that i don't get elsewhere,wishing to express opinions that i believe should be given some thought.the main one would be the having a lot of spare time. But tabforever,i would say you really don't know me if you think the rooster thing is what motivates my posting.But you may say,well i would say that,but i like to think if i say something its 100% what i'm thinking. anyway,maybe if you were to meet me one day we could swap alan clark stories.Hes an interesting fella and does things differently.

Is it not time that trackside changed the way they do their pre race coverage. Personally i much prefer the way the gallops do the pre race,over the way harness do theirs. I would much rather have the trackside people,all of whom are very knowledgable and polite,go through the field naming each horse and driver and having either or,or both presenters making short and succint 2 to 4 sentence comments about each runner(depending on time allowable given field size). And trackside should be able to show the runners as they do so. Each presenter/commentator should after that be able to quickly sum up their selections about 60-90 seconds before race start.Thats when the australian punters would be using that as a guide. There has to be a better way to acknowledge the contribution each runner and connections make,than currently occurs. Currently all we get are presenters/commentators going over their selections with unncessary long trackside shots of a favorite doing half a round warm up. and often the presenters and commentators are selecting the same horses so we get a doubling of the same content. All trackside presenters/commentators know how to say something in a way that is imformative and realistic without offending anyone about all runners. For first starters the likes of what craig rail says about breeding could be appropriate as well as trial form. to me our current trackside coverage dumbs down punters,doesn't recognise each runner and their connections contribution to each race and fails to punters a view of each horse that i believe is imprtant to see hoe the horse has presented and is acting pre race.

I just looked at fridays meeting and i see pinseeker could have run in a $25,000 race this week,where the 4 highest rated horses are the big lebowski,jimmy james mcguire,pure courage and raging whitebait.So i guess they chose to put him in the methven cup instead of the much easier race on friday for a good stake. That still doesn't change the fact that horses who win 2, 3 or 4 races early in their career are still being unfairly penalised in the handicapping system.

When are they going to fix the handicapping system? Pinseeker should never have had to run in yesterdays methven cup,but the handicapping sytem really left connections with little choice if they want to race him. He had started 9 times for 4 wins prior and had his first start less than a year ago. theres something wrong with the handicapping system when a promising 4 win horse like him is forced to run against experienced open class horses so early in his career. Hes the type of horse that connections should have been able to target mid grade races at the cup meeting and run for good money against other horses with similar records. it was like the main race at addington 3 weeks ago. There the 3 win,9 start 3 year old betterthancash had to start in a r60 and faster race. Horses like the above should be able to win more races and more money before they have to race in the top grade. I had thought they were supposed to be changing the handicapping system. Wasn't that one of the recommendations of that horse utilisation group?HRNZ seem to be sitting on their hands and not making the needed changes that were recommended.

yes ,she thought about breaking half way down the straight,but then just dug in for the fight. She was bought just 7 weeks ago 14 august for $3,300 on gavel house. She's earned over $30,000 since. She had been a last start winner for gavin smith when sold ,although she had proved a headache for him at times and going by his comments on unhinged he was pleased to see her go. Smith did think she would make a nice cambridge horse and was suited to small tracks,but as horses can do sometimes,shes exceeded his expectations and proved she can win at addington on a high class night and then on the big methven track. i think a large part of the key is mark jones and his staff,get on well with mares and that having a fresh approach has seen rush wanting to give her best for them. Getting horses to try for you,especially trotters, when they are used to taking the easy way out is a worthy achievement from the jones stable . She will be on a hard mark now,but irrespective of what she may do going forward she has well and truly proved a good purchase. The jones stable has done that with the likes of bella button and lizzie richter in the last couple of seasons. i see ross mccutcheon owned a share in both bella button and rush

Yes,i got my imperials mixed up in that last post of mine. I had seen imperial monarch race earlier in the night when i posted that. Imperial monarch interestingly had 5 starts,2 as a 2yo and 3 as a 3yo, in nz for c mcdowell. is see within 12 months he has won 9 races from about 20 starts and is ruhnning in free for alls at melton.He ran against the likes of queen elida last night.Now he has proved to be a very good buy. I'd be very surprised if alan clarks imperial command gets anywhere near that. The thing is,if tabforever really thinks imperial command is worth $21,000,then how come the horse had only been able to win 1 race ,and 1 non tote(3 horse) penalty free 2yo race,from 48 starts. Mr clark i believe does things very different to most. Does he not have them in the cart as weanlings.His horses have always trotted nice so he knows how to shoe them,and he would have probably the best mannered yearlings in the cart you would see ,bar anyone,because of the work he has already done on them prior. But theres more to just judging whether that is an overall successful strategy based just on the success of a couple of horses,which i agree he has trained.But there are others you will not have heard of. Now he won'r be alone in that,and i'm not knocking him,i'm just saying i don't have to agree with his strategy. After all,had alan clark started training the fiery ginga when he was 4 instead of 1,then i'm sure he would have still been a top horse and highly likely raced longer.People forget that. But i suppose when you have 5 new yearlings every year to train then you need to find out quick if they can go otherwise next thing you have 25 horses in 5 years time.each to their own like i often say.

reading that,I probably didn't word that part quite right. I have been trying to put across my opinion that There being 3 parts to my saying he was over valued at $21,000. firstly because i think the prospective buyers have overestimated they can improve imperial monarch now hes no longer trained and driven by mr clark,secondly because of the longevity factor which i think is very important and thridly based on its race record. I had thought i had inferred the a clark factor when i said earlier ,people underestimate mr clarks abilty in training young horses. Thats what i have been trying to say anyway.

gee you know your alan clark horses.Nice work. and yes you have pointed out some with real longevity. i was aware of the likes of imperial whiz and armed guard.they have gone on to be very good money spinners. constar i know was a good young trotter and of its 7 wins 6 came as a 2 year old. i'm aware he trained some of the others,although theres a couple you've mentioned that i've never heard of. but i still believe in what i have said. And i'm aware of quite a few that you probably have never heard of, that support my way of thinking. my posts on this thread have been about horse values. I've mentioned about 5 horses on this topic. i still think all the people who bid substanial amounts for imperial monarch,(and there were quite a few bidding on him),over valued him. as i say, $21,000 for a horse who had 1 non tote and 1 raceday win out of 48 starts seems excessive. Also ,have you not worked out that i'm the one not undervaluing mr clark as a trainer. And i'm the one who thinks the people who think they can improve imperial monarch simply because mr clark no longer trains it,are misjudging things.

there was some really talented horses racing last night. the racing was very good to watch. The turnovers seemed just average with some races being ok and other not so good. The poorer turnover races were the ones that were timed to start within 3 minutes of an australian gallops or an australian trots race. Those nz races that did that tended to get only 50-60% in turnover compared with the ones that didn't. again it just indicated timeslots and pre race coverage so vital for turnover.Harness nz should always try and have timeslots that follow greyhound races as the australian greyhounds nearly always start either on time,or as soon as the race that preceded them has finished,thus creating more lead in coverage time for the race after them. Who allocates the timeslots anyway because in their hands is the fate of the turnovers.Why doesn't hrnz ever talk about that. as to the racing. I thought stella rouge was a standout winner. maybe thats because i backed it,but in all its trails it looks to have special tyalent and the only query for me was how it would have handled its very hard first race a few months ago. i'm unsure what amanda telfer said about it pre race,but i was surprised it ended up going out to $9 on ff. it had run below par first up,but it was very noticeable that night,if you looked at the replay,that it had a really bad discharge from its nose amd clearly wouldn't have been feeling 100%. stella rouge did have a bit of luck as a result of some team driving by the dunn team that back fired. Allets(dunn trained) was travelling very easily in front,but blair orange was immediately looking for a trail as soon as he saw the stablemate improving some way back.So allets went well also. then marketplace defied the odds and came from last to win. You don't see that much,although it was another race where the team driving for the dunns seemed to backfire.The dunn trained Malakai was having an easy time in front and looked to be in with a top chance,but then b orange kicked up and malakai elected to trail i guess because he saw the john dunn caught wide. Malakai,the horse then seemed to get the pricker with being restrained and just said stuff you by the looks of it. Then marketplace just flew home. Lets hope r todd can keep this horse in top form as he sure is fast and r todd is doing a top job with him.C ferguson seems to have the touch when it comes to driving that horse. also the win of rush showed again what a top trainer mark jones is.I think hes one of the best myself. sam ottley driving great as always. The interesting thing about rush is when he won for gavin smith,unhinged would interview mr smith and he would say that he didn't like the horse and that he was always thinking about sacking it. Maybe the horse knew that,and likes being in its new stable. Having said that rush always used to break for the trainer it had before smith.Anyway mark jones team have it in career best form.

seems the oamaru and waikouaiti trainers have been stopped by the floods from getting to todays meeting. And several prominant drivers also missing. when i saw the floods were effecting waikouaiti early last night,i thought i should put some money on a couple of races where the favorites from the effected areas were likely to be scratched as i would be getting some inflated odds. Unfortunately my tab couldn't accomodate that after backing a couple of losers at addington,but there must be some that did get on early.

good for you for sticking up for mr clark. But the" lay off him" is just a ridiculous comment from you. Who are you saying that to anyway? Why are you so sensitive when it comes to people commenting about something that is real. Everyone knows Mr clark concentrates a lot of his time on getting young trotters going,then he races them a lot.. I know i have never knocked him for doing what is his area of expertise. But,i have every rite to express an opinion that racing a young horse so much early in its life may have an impact on its longevity as it gets older.That opinion is not about mr clark,hes just the most obvious example. How about you go read what i said in this thread anyway. I will repeat it just for you. TAb forever if you had not put" lay off him",then fair enough,but wth that comment you seem to have lost perspective of what has been said.