the galah

one thing that has struck me in recent years is that the decison makers at HRNZ have never promoted a vision that uplifts industry participants and injects a form of comradship and positivity into the industry. from my observations this lack of leadership flows right through to the grass roots. People at all levels,from leadership to trainers and administrators say the right things about doing this and that being needed to retain participants,but when it comes to the crunch they just do their own thing and do whats best for themselves,and so what about the fella next door who's drifting away. Maybe its just a human thing and they may feel they can't do much anyway,but i've formed the opinion that theres an attitude ,a mindset within the industry thats negative and a lack of thinking outside their own we bubble. My point is we need leadership to actually lead and their example needs to make each and everyone just think a little more about whats happening around them industry wise. A positive vision for the future and actual tangible ,sellable, positive plans from industry leadership is where it should start. We recently saw the appointment of the aussie as hrnz leader. then within a couple of weeks he came out and stated " how encouraging it was they were having 7 races at cambridge instead of 6 the week before',despite there much less actual starters. The first thing people would have thought when they saw that would be,well so much for that new guy talking much sense,he must think we are all stupid. Leadership needs to actually lead.

actually thats a very good point. John mooney an owner but probably known more for specialising in breeding as well. Richard bromley always comes across as being in touch with the grass roots owner/trainers whose views often overlooked. This group of people did produce some very good work though.

the question there is where does r todd go and what about the other 3 or 4 trainers with just a couple of horses? Its been on the market for a few months,but the sales pitch of "harness the potential" infers they may be pitching to someone interested in harness racing,which all seems a bit of an unrealistic pitch to me.Hopefully they do get someone like that but who in harness racing has that type of money. Its certainly a wonderful set up but realistically any new development needs to be much bigger land wise and suitable for development in a way that caters for trainers of differing sizes,those with a couple of horses to those with 20-30. Given the larger the portion of land you buy the bigger the value $ per hectare you get you would think it has to be at the very least 100 hectares. it also needs to cater for other aspects like agistment,breakers,people specialising in pre training and other industry related jobs as i mentioned earlier. Theres land agents like justin le lievre and stevie golding whose knowledge of suitable properties they could tap into. at the end of the day,this is a topic that people will think,well thats a good idea that wouild certainly help sustain harness racing into the future and give peace of mind to many struggling with this issue. But the problem is the decision makers at HRNZ seem to be all about plugging holes in a leaking boat. .

you were right. my original post was suggesting the best use of some of the forbury sale proceeds would be setting up a complex in canterbury. in my opinion canterbury harness is without doubt in decline. the issue i raised is significant reason for that in my opinion and needs to be addressed to stop the rot. as to canterbury being awash with horses. if you went to woodend or rangiora on some days you may think that. then you have addington,which is not normally available so you would see no one,then you have motukarara where i'm told you may see only 3 or 4 regulars with only one of those having more than 3 horses currently using that track. doesn't sound awash with horses or trainers to me. then theres this... apart from 5 trainers with starters at addington on friday night,every other trainer has been training for years,most several decades. the 5 recent news ones are john morrison who trains at the ashburton track,sam payne who i believe trains from his fathers propery,luke whittaker who trains in partnership with his father from the fathers propery,robie close who i assume trains at the rangiora track and angela washington who's husband has a property primarily for greyhounds. Then you have the auckland meeting. apart from 2 trainers ,the rest have been around for decades. Only ben butcher,who i magine does not have his own property and gareth hughes who trains in partnership with his father, i assume form his father property if he has one. So effectively i have just proved that not even one trainer who has been taken up training in the last decade, who has a runner competing at the addington or auckland meetings this friday night, has established a new training establishment in the last 10 years. The stonewall establishment is the only new player in the sport in canterbury to have not previously had a training establishment in the last decadealthough there trainers have been around for a while,but they have the luxury of having millions in the bank from other business ventures i rest my case.

forburyclub reportedly did get to retain a share of the $14 million. They just haven't said exactly how much they got.

Victoria apparently in recent years borrowed from the government using the training complex,or part thereof, at melton as security. auckland of course did the same thing with their training complex. so both auckland and victoria showed that investing strategically located areas,have proven over time,they can be a very,very worthwhile thing. just another reason to support my suggestion they should do the same in canterbury..

i type in do ug gale and the computer spits out chief stipe gale. I've tried to edit it but it just keeps coming up as chief stipe gale. maybe the chief has programmed it that way,for chief stipe to replace the name do ug whenever that names used. whats going on there? Seems rather spooky to me. p.s. it spelt the name do ug with a space in it as it did it again.

the group comprised john mooney,chairman together with clark barron,karen blanchard,david branch,jason broad,richard bromley,john denton,arna donnelly,Chief Stipe gale,peter larkin,bill mcdonald,andrew morris,scott phelan,regan todd and matthew white. i'm surprised no one has commented on the repoert released just over a week ago. its lengthy and covers many issues,some rather thorny things like handicapping,scratching penalties,etc. Ive read it and theres so much common sense recommended policy wise,to come out of that report, that it makes you wonder where have they been. my question would be ,just this week hrnz announced some minor changes to the handicapping system in that report,but not everything recommended,including no mention of recommendations around the morse substative handicapping issues.Why not? hopefully some of the common sense to come out of that report rubs off on hrnz decision makers.

people who own their own properties or are wealthy dont have this problem. but most are not in that position. so ask yourself this.. if your a trainer in canterbury with 30 horses in work,renting someone elses training facilites and the owner of the propery decides to sell,where do you go? if your a trainer wanting to train 1 horse in canterbury,where do you go? if you own a broodmare in canterbury with a foal at foot and don't have your own property,where are you going to keep them so you can afford to breed again next year.Simply put,is there a choice locally of paying $30 each for your broodmare and foal each week and check on them yourselves,or do you have to pay the going rate of mostly around $80 a week for each on an agistment farmi. In other words do you spend the extra $5200 a year just to graze them,knowing that would be your breeding money gone. many other scenarios for which lots of people in canterbury would have encountered. well i know the answer to the above. maybe the fella with the 30 horses will be accomodated somewhere.who knows where,but people do tend to help someone like that but that would be a one off. But all other scenerios,don't waste your time looking because if you do you will be disappointed. take the 5 tracks closest to christchurch. Addington,motukarara,rangiora,ashburton,methven.You ring them tomorrow and ask them do they have facilities to rent. The answer will be no. You drive around your district and stop and ask property owners,put ads in you local newspaper for grazing for your broodmare. even if you were able to pay more.will you find somewhere.No you won't. Reality is this issue is real,its major and no one is addressing it. The issue has been there for a couple of decades now,but its getting worse. canterbury is the heart of harness racing in new zealand but it needs an affordable complex where people can keep their harness horses to retain the numbers participating.And the only way to get that is for HRNZ to allocate funds for that. As i have said,such a complex properly run should still be able to generate a small profit. Hrnz got $14 million from forbury.

Interesting you can form that opinion when i think your 3 key points are actually the strongest arguments for my suggestion and against what you say. Just look at whats going on in the auckland/waikato region. auckland ,quite rightly from their point of view,are currently very vocal about the importance of having a training complex for their district. They recognise that having sold the one they did have to get out of debt,that its imperative for them to provide industry participants in the area a new complex from which they can base themselves.They know,without such a complex,they won't have the numbers to have race meetings. And you would be aware that the Auckland club has been vocal about the need for HRNZ to contribute funds to a new training complex. ask yourself this. what makes more sense. Putting industry funds into a training complex for a district(auckland) that provides a product that will always be heavily subsidised to keep it going. Or put industry funds into a similar complex with as great,if not greater need in canterbury ,where the product supplied generates income and is not subsidised. your second point is owners/breeders/punters would not be satisfied. Clearly the punters don't agree with that. They invest their $ far more on the canterbury product than the auckland product. Owners and breeders,well obviously if they're from the upper north island,they will be parochial and wants whats best for them,but numbers wise there are far more owners in the south island. Same applies to the breeders. So if we applied your perspective,you would be prioritising the minority over the majority. now i'm not saying auckland should or shouldn't get industry support,i'm just pointing out the obvious that canterbury has a far stronger case. also,don't you think it would be hypocrisy for those suggesting auckland be assisted to provide a training cimplex and not canterbury,when the problem is the same. when i started the topic i was not comparing auckland to canterbury,but have addressed the comparisons as you brought it up.

recently HRNZ issued a press staement about the $14 million they had received from the forbury park sale. heres what i think they should do with a large portion of the funds. canterbury is the backbone of the industry,but i believe Canterbury harness racing has a problem, that is going to start significantly impacting on harness racings horse numbers and publics perception in the next 10 years if they don't start planning for it now. the serious problem being,if you want to train,graze,breed,agist,etc... where can you do it in canterbury and if you do happen to find somewhere, will it be affordable. you either have to be wealthy or have your own property these days or both. if your in canterbury,just look at the internet .Prices for a 10 hectare bare blocks anywhere near christchurch.Most are around a million dollars.In areas away from christchurch small blocks of land are still very expensive. so realistically you would think no one is going to be able to afford to set up there own training establishment unless they go some way out. the other option is renting off current owners of training establishments. Now theres 2 reasons thats unlikely.1)trainers like to do there own thing and very few have any interest whatsoever in accomodating other trainers on their properties whether they be someone wanting to train 1 horse or 10 horses.2) if you owned a bit of ground worth over a million,are you going to subdivide and sell it for that or are you going to lease it out for minimal returns if you no longer train.obviously your going to sell. its not just training properties where the squeeze is coming,its grazing your broodmare,grazing your spelling horse or retired racehorses. anyone who has looked for grazing can attest to that. Either you pay rates that most cant afford or you give away or dispose of your horses. The sad reality is no one really wants them if you try and find a home for them. The life after racing horses programmes dont cater for horses over 12. There are several people out there doing there best ,to find homes for horses over that age,but there simply isn't anywhere to put them. How does the fate of those horses reflect on the industry in this day and age.many of those horses could be broodmares. so the solution. hrnz should buy 100 hectares and set up a training establishment in an area within 30 minutes drive of christchurch. where. Well for example you can get 100 hectares for 4 million near leeston.maybe somewhere drier to the west of that is more realistic. stables should be built,fencing,tracks,etc it would be a self funding establishment where the likes of up and coming trainers who have done their time in stables can use to try and establish themselves,also trainers who want to train only very small numbers but have no where else to go,breakers who are trying to establish themselves,part of the land could be dedicated to an agistment farm at affordable rates for harness horses. Breeders could place their horses with trainers willing to train for a racing half share and could have their broodmares agisted on the property at affordable rates. .Theres all sorts of possibilities.Stables made available at minimal rates for travelling trainers. You could have a farrier renting and operating out of a stabing block,a vet in another area emplyed by hrnz as a way of providing veterinarian care at affordable prices. a feed store operated by a local harness feed merchant who discounts for bulk orders for harness horse owners. Everything done in a way that hrnz helps keeps cost affordable for those with harness horses yet hrnz still getting a cut to make minimal profits.when you think about it,why do farriers and vets seem so expensive. its because your paying a lot for the travel and time they travel to you.Take that out and its more affordable. paddocks set aside for Hay to be grown and sold at discounted prices to horse trainers and owners on the propery. all sorts of other possibilites but you get my drift. i think it could easily soon become home for over 250 horses. Also there are many retired trainers with so much knowledge willing and able to pass that on if given the chance. such trainers could be mentors rostered on to oversee and chat and offer advice.Owners wouldn't have far to come from christchurch.its also about being located in an area not too far from affordable housing. call me a dreamer,but ask yourself this. Is HRNZ better spending money on short term stakes funding for things like slot races or increasing age group races or series races they are helping fund that they were never supposed to....or are they better in laying down the framework and providing solutions for the long term viability of harness racing for the next few decades. also remember that ,but in the right location and the land alone could become a ever appreciating valued asset. currently we have a pro racing minister in government. That should be used to harness racings benefit while they can,if borrowings were required initially,,with of course the property the security. always remember ,just how important a strong canterbury harness racing scene is to the industry.

you got me typing again gammalite. What you also have to consider is, what province has had the highest number of participants drop out of the game in the last 5 years? my guess,and its a pretty safe and obvious guess,and easily enough observed if you lived there, is canterbury is the region. especially small time trainers and breeders are walking away from harness racing . if you lose 2 or 3 from an area like auckland where numbers are already small,those that leave are easily noticed. on the other hand lose 20 or 30 trainers and breeders a year from a district that had 10 times the size of auckland to start off with,people dont notice as much or place the appropriate degree of long term importance. Long term, industry leaders need to have the forsight to see that the providers of the mainstay area of harness racings core business income, is eroding at a snowballing rate.. So why do industry leaders implement policies that show they care more about auckland participants than those in canterbury? none of the industry decision makers seem to have a logical,justifiable answer to that question? I think your suggestion of using the queensland model for racing in the north island is a more realistic possible model.Queensland obviously have far more horses,but they run many $4000 races at redcliffe and $10,000 races at albion park. The way they increase drivers,trainers,owners incomes and make breeding more viable is they start their horses more.So while the betting may be limited,stakes paid come closeto matching income received from betting. Industry leadership should give the auckland stakeholers the choice,either come up with a sustainable model themselves or try the queensland model. as to tuesday racing. i have always said its a good idea. But mini canterbury meetings for canterbury participants are just as important as those in auckland. its just a matter of the racing getting appropriate lead in sky racing coverage in australia on tuesdays and running at the appropriate timeslots for that. That point,in my opinion, is such an important factor,and entain no doubt realise that. i don't understand why people don't place the importance lead in sky racing coverage deserves when discussing what impacts turnovers,whatever the meeting.Why don't our industry leaders or entain ever explain that and explain what they are doing to mensure that happens.

I didn't realise i had left the site either. i still read both bit of a yarn and Channel X and think posters on both sites are passionate about harness racing and like to see it thrive. contributors each have their own perspective on the industry and if the industry is to prosper forums like this provide a barometer as to what people are actually thinking. Of course such forums should have a welcoming environment to expressions of differing points of view,without those that run it getting too annoyed about someones elses differing opinion.. i decided that after reading the chiefs multiple put down replies to a topic i commented on a bit, that he wasn't at that point meeting the degree of fairness that should be applied,so i moderated him in reverse and decided to stop posting and instead just read the forums. i thought he just sounded like there may be other stuff going on in his mind as he seemed in a bit of a negative space in his head. I'm not saying he wouldn't have good reason to come across as in that frame of mind sometimes. we all can get a bit like that . He may not agree with that,i don't value whether he does anyway. the chiefs words were... it was people with views like mine that were killing the industry. I just read that and thought,well thats ok for you to think that,and dumbo i already had worked out you thought that anyway,but thats just too unneccsarily hostile. As you realise jj,when chief gets a bee in his bonnet about someone he acts more like theres a hive of wasps there. anyway.nice to hear from you. i'm actually finding not posting and just reading these forums just as interesting. this reply is defintely a one off and i will stick to that. Anyway,You've only got to read peoples replies,especially regular contribtors to see the passion and knowledge the contributors have for harness racing. So whether it be the chief or scooby,i'm grateful to them that i have somewhere where i can read what other people are thinking.i still fill in my day by reading everyones replies each day.

Just another reason to say something negative is my take on your reaction to my post. your site,do as you wish. I made a living for many years.did you? i don't bother trying to do that now due to the tab changing things and returns no longer match the time and effort i put in. but you questioning my analysis of races just because you have different opinions to mine is all a bit silly. if my opinions were similar you wouldn't. so your justification for your comment is flawed. As to the j cox drive on majestic man. so what happened to majestic man after he ran that,tactically poor,strength sapping but courageous race.??? retired,no more racing. did you not read what phil williamson said about where his strengths lay. I have since pointed out that i think j ocx is currently in career best form,but his drive on majestic man was not his brightest tactically. anyway,i think even the thick skinned like myself get tired of your name calling. so i won't give you any more opportunities ,as you seem to have become consistently rather negative in the words you use these days. Bit of a shame,but i can tell thats how you feel,so better out than in i always say. so my final words about your replies to my posts is....Whatever chief. I used a capital W just to emphasis that,as even small things like that can irritate you.

removing the reference to suicide due to harmful communications act. WTF is that all about. lost your sense of humour bill. There comes a time when i have made my point and you have yours and we just start repeating ourselves.. so i think now's the ideal time for me to put my que back in the rack until another time perhaps. one parting shot for you. i remember very early on in the covid pandemic,commenting on this website,saying the lab leak was the most logical explanation. well before it got media attention. i remember posting about the bat lady and the work they did on creating an extremely contagious coronavirus easily spread from bats to humans in the wuhan lab.Just around the corner from where the wet market was that they were saying it came from. And i also remember you heavily criticsing my posts on that,saying all the same things about me that you have on this topic,referring to studies and sequencing etc,etc...all confirming in your mind i was stupid and you were right about the pangolin being the likely source. well who turned out to be the stupid one chief? You know i was a bit obssessed with covid early on,a couple of months before it got any coverage here or even on american tv. I had seen on the bbc a segment from their chinese correspondent in november i think it was,where he was reporting on the early lockdowns in wuhan,reporting on people in full protective gear colllecting the bodies left at peoples front doors,observations of bodies that had lay in the streets for a couple of days where people had just dropped. Early on he interviewed an english schoolteacher who lived in wuhan,who said,hang on they are officailly saying this only started a couple of weeks ago,but people have been known to have neen dropping for weeks now and while they have locked down the locals,international visitors have been and are still coming and going through wuhans airport,the busiest airport in central china,located in the centre of chinas airline route network.So,while he didn't say so,it was obvious to conclude it would effect the whole world. I remember going around telling everyone i worked with or interacted with,that this is going to be one of the biggest things in our lifetimes. i was saying that before they even reported it on our or other major outlets apart from those early bbc reports and weeks before they were saying other countries had anyone with it.It just seemed so obvious to me what was going to happen. people used to look at me as if i was stupid or a conspiracy nut. my point is i follow my insticnts and i believe i have always had very good instincts. i apply the same logic and common sense to my observations in racing, agree with me or not. thats up to you.

I'm the galah chief ,you need to look skyward for me,not underground. But i've worked out your real identity chief. Bill murray,is that you chief?????? one of my favorite films was caddyshack. you think i'm the gopher perhaps.. remember how that ended....LOL...

i haven't a clue,people groaning withy pity at what i write,waste of time for you trying to get me to understand. New wording for you there chief. Same meaning ,but different words. hmmm. you work on the theory that saying something over and over again will eventually lead you and others to believe what it is you say. Hey that does work to a degree,but not with me. duh chief.....you refer to the advancement in testing but fail to mention the advancement in labs comming up with new drugs,often drugs with only small changes from the make up of existing drugs,but enough to avoid detection because they aren't testing for them. We discussed this previously on another topic. You thought all the trainers who saw big increases in their horses performances and went to the top of the premiership tables when they starting using the performance enhancers they were sold(what you call snake oil),well you put that down to coincidence. They didn't,just look at the data around the timeframes of those using them and the immediate success they had. I referred you to the yonkers trainers. no one returned a positive in those cases but i even quoted a couple of judges sentencing remarks referring to the admissions of using performance enhancers by all those that went to jail. Then i have previously quoted what some of the leading experts over there said and how hard they said it was to keep up with detecting some new performance enhancers because the labs making the performance enahncers could easily just make small changes to the drugs make up to avoid detection and also they didn't have the funding to test for everything or enough research on identifying the latest thing. still you say,they were all duped and sold snake oil.yeh right. Was that a typing error and did you mean 501,have me deported back to the darkside..lol. But they haven't caught the likes of grimson have they. As to so many positives,wheres the evidence there has been that. my theory.....is the likes of trainors positive is not because he has done anything different. I beleive there has to be something different in the make up of the products they are being treated with from batch to batch,possibly the make up of the horses is seeing different detectable times,their past exposure to whatever,etc... Most likely a combination of those things which has lead to the detection of something they have been using.

Rather watch the races tonight actually. just backed imperial command. big run for 3rd,caught late. had no trial this week,bit unusual for him. was paying $71 at one stage. oh well. Off the top of my head... lance armstrong,florence griffith joyner(flo jo),marion jones... the 30 or so USA horse trainers,most of whom went to jail a couple of years ago...oh thats right you said the poor buggas were duped and sold snake oil....light and sound,remember that one. Anyway i have to focus on addington now. Enjoy your night.

no idea,crap conspiracy theory,warped credibility,bring racing into disrepute,bullshit can't you fit a few more into your next post on this topic? Just tell me what you really think chief as i'm feeling too comfortable with that latest reply. p.s.Name calling indicates to me i'm winning this argument. Lol.

interesting study chief. But your working on the premise that the performance enhancing effects only apply if it is detectable in testing. Of course we know thats not true for many things. EPO a classic example of that. Also it seems to be a study relating to single dose.. In other words,what do multiple doses do and that may be a way around the detection in testing while still getting performance enhancing effects. I say that because i was told 15 years ago when it first hit the headlines that some trainers were known to be dosing their horses 5 days in a row. also the observations of the horses behavior. the study says for one type of admistration, behavioral changes were noticed for up to 6 minutes,but then back to normal. so even going by the testing results in the study,there was no apparent noticable changes in behavior when the most significant amounts of the drug were in the system. So the study proves normal behavioral changes can not be used as an indication of adminsitration beyond 6 minutes. Then theres the half life. the curve for that starts off with a steep decline in the first few hours but then levels out quite quickly.

What would favorite backers be thinking tonight.????? Race 1. midfrew lucre -opened at $3.70,closed at $1.95. Driver elects to go 4 back fence in 7 horse field. Gets out late for 2nd. Oh well an amatuer drivers race so can forgive i suppose. race 2.hawkeye pierce-opens $1.70 closes $1.40. getting the 1/1 for herlihy,thats good,hang on did he just push put with 1200m to,seems he thinks so as he heavily restrains hawkeye to let d butcher get past him,hang on d butcher just strolls to the front,oh dear,beaten into 2nd. Not to worry,he did pull and at least he was close enough turning in i suppose. Race 3.stone cold $4.20 into $2.10. Straight to front,wins easy. thats more like it.well done p ferguson. race 4. red rackham $5 into $1.90. gee they must be confident here. hang on d butcher elects to sit 4 back the fence,oh no pulling triple on a walkiing speed,35 quarter,pushes out but all done,pulled too hard. D butcher didn't get the email about being a winner. race 5.illsa son or taylad to you $4 equal favorites. what to do. taylad to you wins by a nose,nice drive t macfarlane but illsa son mmmm,driver elects to sit 5 back the fence. Must be waiting for next week. Race 6.better knuckle up $1.80 into $1.30 whale must have tipped him out as a roughie. Hang on,s phelan driving. can't be right s phelan driving a horse paying a $1.30 to win. .....mmmmm,dear oh dear,what a drive,not trying?,no probably was trying as it was s phelan,i will see him at my local butchers tomorrow as i think he works there part time. race 7. magic dash $5 into $3.50. drawn 1 the inside off 10m...oh dear,you guessed it,settles 5 back the fence,only gets out when race already over. The moral of the story. not a good look if your trying to promote betting at auckland. And no i'm not talking through my pocket. But Punters,especially those who bet on hot favorites, like to at least get a run for their money.certainly didn't happen tonight.

The 3 trainers you intially mention. j dickie,j cox,h cullen. Ii would say only johnny cox can be classified as someone who is happy training both good horses and your average run of the mill horses that owners can get a lot of pleasure from,without making money.Hes santas excuse an example of that. Many successful trainers have a policy of identifying the horses who can at least get close to paying their way and if not,well many are discarded. No one can be blamed for having that approach.it obviously works for them and their owners. But from an industry perspective,theres wastage of a resource that is badly needed to sustain harness racing. Thats why i ask this question and give an example.. Why does the indutry not do more to keep the grass roots people involved. e.g. P Andrews. a trainer from invercargill that few would ever think of as being important to the industry and because of that industry leadership would never give him a second thought. well p andrews has lined up his horses more times than h cullen in each of the last 4 years,and more in 3 of the last 4 years than j dickie or j cox. Tomorrow he has a horse going around. Sly tricks. 109 starts for 1 win. Last start 20 lengths last. What are hrnz doing to retain that mans participation. Nothing . what could they do. well tomorrow,instead of putting him in a 10 horse 1 win race where he has no chance,why didn't they put him in the non win 7 horse field,where most likely even at his best,rival trainers would be happy to see him.It would have been a win/win decision for him and the club. just common sense to me. No one likes running last,even if you are a battler. So how long will he last for. to retain his enthusiasm,there should be things in place that will help him think he is valued. They should have contacted him and said we are dropping your horse back to a non win field because we value you,would be a good start point.

your defintion of what i was trying to achieve was never the same as mine. My defintion,well i know what thoughts are in my mind and i have been successful putting my point of view across.. Anyway,even going by your defintion,i would say,failure was always going to be success in progress.

i agree with that. My dots don't form a solid line. but my dots still end up at the right final destination. In my opinion of course.

I had discussed that levamisole was good for some things earlier. I have never said it was bad,just have said it has been recognised as having performance enhancing qualities and gone into what they may be. Hence its with holding time. So you have a trainer who can significantly improve nearly all the horses he gets off other trainers. Then he has 2 positives for a substance thats known as a performance enhancer. So,its not unreasonable to have an opinion that the use of performance enhancers is a factor in their success and is an indication of their practices. I don't need to harden up,just pointing out the language you used doesn't add anything to your argument.You can keep calling me what you want,i just have a chuckle most of the time. I get the ivermmectin thing for people who believe it may help,but never thought about it much myself.