the galah

I understand where your coming from,i just don't agree that there were many trainers who had been pushing their horses to race in the higher stake races in april/may anyway.I thought the most popular thought was,whats the point running them early because only 2 or 3 stables win those races.Better off to give them another 4-6 months to develop.So i think not much will change other than the winners will be the horse thats in the best form in november instead of may.As you say,that may give some horses more time to catch up on those that were earlier developers. The reason you will get more 2 year olds racing latter in the year is because you already had lots of 3 year olds doing that,so now you change those 3 year olds back to aged 2,obviously that means there will be more 2 year olds race. Why would a horse that previously was not ready to race until november be at an advantage when in reality he will be racing the very same horses that he would have been prior to the change.

I don't agree with your assessment there doomed. I think its written in a way thats easy to understand.Have you read the whole survey? Having the opportunity to express an opinion to the decision makers has got to be a good thing. I think your a bit out of touch if you think the trainers and drivers and owners are happy just racing at addington.Don't think they are the ones driving the centralization strategy. When you say the topics raised in the survey is unlikely to get much comment on here. I would say where have you been? I would suggest you fill the survey in. You should fill the survey in as well nowornever.You have opinions worth hearing. It would be a strange strategy for hrnz to conduct a survey,get results which indicate people have opinions the same as yours nowornever,then have hrnz implement changes that the survey results indicate aren't supported by its participants. Now that may happen,but that doesn't seem to make much sense. So i think you should fill the survey in ,in good faith so to speak,and see what the overall results of it are. The problem with racing in canterbury over winter is the weather is so bad that who wants to train horses in the rain all the time. It started raining about 6 months ago and has hardly stopped since.Bring on el nino.

To the whales credit,he has changed things around a bit this week. Hes given a preview of the late quaddies at this weeks harness meetings. That will confuse the bookies at the tab a bit and they won't be able to use his knowledge to sucker in punters as easy. Giving a more varied preview where he says in some legs there may be a standout, but in other legs there are 3 or 4 main chances,at least gives the punters some good advice while inviting them to use some of their own brain power if they want to select just one of those mentioned. Also there is a greater possiblity of higher returns if punters do invest on his suggested quaddie and it came home..

Oh and i have discovered why HRNZ said horses birthdays, the premierships and all that which go from january 1 to december 31, are different from the racing season which is still 1 august to 31 july. Its because the racing act refers to the season as being from august to july and it takes some time to change such things. And of course factor in the thoroughbreds have never changed so that would mean that also means changes in the racing act,thats why it is as it is. The result is 2 years on and people are still confused about the harness racing season

Its actually an interesting subject and i think there was always more logical reasons to keep things as they were and not change. The main reason seemed to be because australia have done it,we had to. Now when a horse oficially turns 1 its really about 1 year 1-2 months old whereas in the past that same horse might have only been 10-11 months old. Sure they may be better developed when it comes time for the bigger races that could be programmed later in the season,but its only the select few that run in those races. They aren't actually adding anything to a horses racing longevity. HRNZ claimed there is scientific evidence it extends a horses racing career.How on earth do you get scientific evidence around something when its never had a chance to be tested? Thats like claiming the covid vaccine has no long term side effects for anyone. Its a bit like moving the goal posts while at the same time moving the field so as to compensate for the goalposts being moved. The aussies also said it brought them in line with the horses born in the likes of the USA. That seemed a strange argument because the reason the recognised birthdays was different was because the northern hemisphere and the southern hemisphere have different climate seasons.That one is a bit of a no brainer so there was never any logic in that one. Thoroughbreds in the southern hemisphere haven't changed. They seem to recognise that the climate seasons are the major factor in when horses come into season and are born,and base there seasons around that. Both aussie and hrnz said they hoped it may increase numbers being bred. That was like saying i wish the sun comes out in christchurch each day over winter. It was nothing but wishful thinking and never deserved a mention. There were other reasons given,but they weren't convincing either. What i wonder about was how it will effect the timeframes around mares being bred. For example we had a mare who always carried her foals about 11 months 3 weeks. a couple of times we only sent her to stud in late december and she had foals that were born after january 1.She was always easy to get in foal(no additives earlier in life always helped that),but won't they now limit some mares from being served after january 1. Like i said its an interesting subject.

The confusion certainly seems to be in the wording of some of the previous press statements from HRNZ. Its confusing anyone who reads them. The latest press release seems to say there is a harness racing year from 1 january to 31 december but at the same time there is a harness racing season from 1 august to 31 july.It says that in the latest press release on hrnz. Back on 6 august 2021 they said there was a transitional season between 1 august 2021 and 31 december 2021...... so you would have thought that meant the new season started on 1 january. Then in that same press release said the premierships would be january to december and horses birthdays on 1 january. It reminds me of one of those early scream movies ...its the perfect crime cindy,BUT WAIT,THERES MORE.... Now they have always said they will do the renewing of licences at the tradional time,on 31 july so at least that part wasn't confusing. They never changed when the future racing dates would be released,but that never seemed to get much of a mention. But wait theres more......the new funding of stakes came into effects from 1 august,but did all the increases start then....well no,the 2 year old bonus comes into effect from 1 january next year. Now back in 2021 they said in a couple of press releases there seems to be some confusion over when the new season starts.......Ya reckon much has changed? Those early scream movies were much funnier than the latest one that came out a couple of years ago. Maybe more appropriate would be that music from the tv series soap that was so popular back in the late 1970's early 80's. The one that normally ended with...confused,tune in next week...

Who really has the answers for what happens in china. Thats the point.. Theres an undeniable link between pregnant female horses and the use of a product taken from their blood to help reproduction in livestock,primarily pigs. Currently china is importing 100% female horses from nz. Maybe its the free trade agreement that helps. Nz was one of only 26 countries that had one with china in 2022. Chinas the largest importer of donkeys yet they have the 2nd highest number in the world.China still this year importing as many donkeys as they can get their hands on from africa.Africa has the most donkeys in the world(ethiopia having the most) . Many african countries now have banned the legal donkey trade with china due to it pushing the donkeys prices too high in their countries.. horses were listed as the 559th most traded product in the world. Canada seems to rank 8th as the exporter of horse meat.European countries are their biggest markets. Canada now has a lucrative live horse export market with japan.They get fattened up and sold for horsemeat. Those horses reportedly sell for between $8-9,000 in japan.Thats canadian $ so would be about $11,000 nz dollars. So obviously if the horse is valued at something similar for the horsemeat in a country like china,then surely it follows they would be valued far greater if they could be used in a blood farm. Its a strange old world sometimes. All about the money i suppose.

So if you look at the stakes being paid out by clubs who have received the extra funding its pretty obvious some clubs have not passed on the extra funding in most of their races. Take the races at addington on sunday. Most of the races are being run for $10,000 The hrnz model which said the stakes would be increased, referred to the provincial standard meetings getting $11,500 per race. So in effect thats $1500 per race the club isn't passing on. ($12,000 for the whole day). Furthermore,the stakes are just the same as they were at the end of last year. The meeting on friday at addington i assume is classed as a metro 2 meeting(the lower funded of the metro meetings according to the hrnz model) For that the clubs are funded $15,000 a race. Yet most races are only being run for $13-14,000. Overall $8000 less being paid out than they are funded. Compare that to aucklands next thursday meeting. Auckland has passed on the extra funding. Ashburton the same with their stakes- $10,000. Methven have increased their stakes to $11,000. Winton intend paying mostly stakes of $12,000. So like we have seen before,these supposed stakes increases often never materialise. Its all just hot air for some clubs and for other clubs,they are doing their best to pass on the increases. This week,Addington have no one to compete against to attract horses as the only 2 meetings in the whole of the south island are at addington. Thats why they know,well if you don't race here,you can't race anywhere else ,so we will take a bit of your money and probably put it into the higher class races down the track. If history is anything to go by,addington will only pass on the extra funding when they have to compete against other canterbury clubs running meetings the same week.

I'm not a subscriber to peter profit but do occasionally look at his headlines and one that catches the eye is his recent reference to the horses being exported to china.I don't have access to what he has written. Its a topic that i have always found very interesting. Anyone who bothers to have a look at the recent HRNZ exported list must have noticed something odd is going on with the exports to china.Every horse exported to china was female. Numbers wise more than half of the total number of harness horses exported last month from nz went to china. (more than australia) I posted on this topic 3-4 years ago. At the time my comments were viewed as one for the conspiracy theorists,but is peter profit suggesting he has information confirming my theory. The topic i raised was about the possiblilty that the mares/fillies exported to china and in particular inner mongolia, could be destined to a rather frightening eventual fate. To remind people,4-5 years ago swine flu hit the world and china being the biggest producer and consumer of pork was especially hard hit.Between 2018-2019 it was estimated the number of pigs dropped by 225 million, pigs either died or were put down due to the swine flu. Fast forward to today and chinas pig numbers have bounced back to their highest in 5 years. This year china is estimated to have over 452 million pigs,which is over half the worlds total pig population. So whats the connection with nz harness horses.. Well there is massive demand for the pmsg hormone(pregnant mare serum gonadotropin) which when used with progestogen promotes regular ovulation and maintaining pregnancy in pigs and other livestock.In other words pigs ovulate on command so they produce more offspring.It tricks the bodies into producing larger litters of pigs and brings them back into season quicker. So pregnant horses produce this pmsg,known as red gold,early in their pregnancy up to 140 days.Mares being used for this purpose are generally aborted and then reserved so they can again fall pregnant and start the pmsg cycle again. Disturbingly, malnourished mares produce more concentrated pmsg hormone. So given the northern part of china and in particular inner mongolia are the areas in china which have seen big increases in pig farms, is it not beyond being considered a reasonable assumption that if they aren't going to race,WHY WOULDN"T THEY end up at these blood farms. They are so VALUABLE as producers of this hormone. If those exported do give birth,what is the fate of their progeny. Going by what i have read,it seems if they are female they pretty much end up the same as their mothers. Now these blood farms seemingly are all around the world. I knew of one not far from where i once lived. Very secretitive and it eventually moved to way under the southern alps,a long way from prying eyes.I was told it wasn't a big deal in nz at the time and at least in nz they would have some type of regulations and cruelty oversight,but overseas many countries don't. Big pharma worldwide apparently make big money off the blood farms.As to the pig farmers,for example its estimated 4 out 5 german sows have the horse hormone used on them. So its not just china,but china do have some unusual traditions. Like it was only about 10 years ago that china was blamed for cutting africas donkey population in half as they sought to use the donkeys in their medicines. But its china who are taking the nz horses and in particular the areas in china. Which leads to the inevitable. Here i was last week getting this email form HRNZ about a horse in my care that i had given away to a good home 20 years ago.Fair enough,they should keep records,but surely people must be able to see the double standards as relates to all the mares that are being exported to china.Does anyone seriously believe they are going to china for harness racing. It does make you wonder about how the horse is often treated as just a commodity by many.

So he got 2 winners,2 2nds and 1 3rd. from his 8 selections.The highest dividend being a $2.20 winner.That one did open at $3.20 before the whales influence crunched its odds. The hrnz website always has a video clip of his selections yet they never have the unhinged clips. Hard to work it out sometimes.

So to prove the point,take this weeks whale watch selections as an example. He selected 8 starters and 1 scr. Of the 8 starters,6 have or will start hot favorites,with the other 2 starting 2/1 in the betting. All paying unrealistic short odds. When the tab slash his selections ff odds throughout the day,they never lengthen the other horses odds until the very last minute. Its extremely rare for him to tip a horse at a reasonable price. I do remember one that he did because i had thought it would win myself. It was spirited belle about a year ago and it opened at $41 and closed at $11. It could have proven one of the best whale tips ever,but s abernethy the driver failed to get the memo and drove like he was waiting for next week and every move he made blocked it in and it finished hard held.The following week in a similar field it won paying under $3,with the whale tipping it again.

we've all seen the TAB bookmakers open his selections at realistic ff odds,then the whale obviously backs his horses as soon as the markets come out on 2 or 3 accounts,and then the bookmakers immediately slash the odds to about half of what would be a realistic price. There are occasions when his selections odds don't change at that early stage,and i believe they are the times the whale thinks his selections are too far under the realistic odds. So because of this,not long after the ff odds are out,his selections are not at realistic prices and no one should be betting on them for that reason alone. Anyone who claims they can make money from following the trackside whale watch selections overall is either living in the past or simply aren't telling the truth.In one recent period of 3 months i wrote down all his selections and did a profit/ loss record and there was no way you would come out ahead. So the upshot of it all is the whale may be able to make money by getting on at the opening prices,but those who bet on his whale watch selections will not. The question i would ask,by him being on trackside do turnovers increase or decrease.Personally i think trackside have more suitable presenters than him. No one denies his knowledge. But theres no doubt he is an asset for the TAB bookies who do the ff .Thats why they hype him so much on trackside. Harness racing betting pools are clearly dropping. Less people are participating in betting.This has been happening while we see more of the whale and the tab hype his selections more.The whales influence on ff and tote prices has become greater as the betting pools drop.Thats not a good thing.

The TAB have a deliberate policy of setting his selections at reduced odds,working on the theory that he's pretty good at picking winners. It works for them and i'm sure they love the whale as they know they may take the occasional loss,but that they will come out a fair way ahead in the long run by selling bets at ridiculously short odds.. But i think its a bad thing the TAB promote his selections as if they are doing the punters a favour and are giving punters good advice. If they are to use the whale,what they should be doing is telling people his selections and at the same time telling them what the whale considers is a realistic price for his selections.That should be in brackets beside his selections whenever it features on trackside.

The head of harness racing australia said the slot holders only fund half and harness racing australia come up with the other million. He said a while back that its "unashamedly designed to grow the australian harness racing industry.it is part of our strategy to encourage owners and participants to buy australian born yearlings". Those retention barns only stop treatments in the short timeframe a couple of days before a race.The experts say if someone was using the likes of epo it would be in the weeks leading into a race,not when in the retention barn.Has a retention barn ever caught anyone in australia?

Interesting how they have done the pyramid on the HRNZ website which shows $3.4 million of the extra $5 million in stakes paid next year is going into "base" races.So what is deemed a base race? Well the only way i could get a figure of $3.4 million was to add the provincial low key,provincial standard,the provincial features(excluding the country cups),all the metro meetings and the $750k 2year old bonuses. That came to $3.4 million. So it seems the only races not considered base races are the country cup races,11 or so premier meetings,the 2 nz cup week meetings,and the race(cambridge).So that means all except about 155 races run each are classified as a "base" race by hrnz. It appears the cut off for their description of a base race is any race where the stake is under $20,000(which is the aforementioned 155 races per year). A bit of smoke and mirrors happening? The anomaly of the $20,000 cut off is that when they run a race programmed for 2 year olds,if the winner is having its first 2 year old win,then that would mean that races stake/bonus would be well over $20,000.Strangely, if that occurs in a standard 2 year old race on a metro night,that race would be paying out more money than any standard premier race run all year. The way they did their pyramid diagram seems strange as it doesn't progress in numerical size increases. Good thing they didn't design the actual pyramids.

The only thing that is a little unclear is the wording,mick guerins article says it applies to a 2 year olds first totalisator win,whereas hrnz says its for their first win in a 2yo totalisator race.From guerins article he is working on the assumption that should a non win race be programmed for 2 year olds and above,that it applies.Which seems a fair assumption.

I see a write up on the hrnz website says the connections of any 2year old winning its first race from next year will get $8,000 for its first win and the breeder will get $4,000. Or put it another way. The owners and breeders of every horse aged 3 or over will receive $12,000 less when winning their first race,than the owners/breeders of a 2 year old winner. There is your answer as to who HRNZ prioritize, and who they don't. Once people wake up and realise this is the case, i predict it will cause division and disenchantment amongst those who don't race or win 2 year old races,in other words 95% of the owners and breeders out there. I don't have much idea who it is that makes these decisions,but its pretty obvious whoever these people are,which trainers they are looking after and who they almost certainly would get to train a horse they owned.You don't have to be einstein to work that out.

I've always been a swinging voter and have voted nz first several times,although didn't last time as i thought winston somehow lost himself a bit in what he was saying, leading into the last election. So far this year he seems more like the old winston that i respected. The media coverage of the launch the other day was a little bewildering. They showed a packed room with no vacant seats,then the reporter said the numbers were somewhat disappointing as there were many empty seats. I actually thought i must of heard it wrong so rewound it,but sure enough thats what she said despite showing pictures to the contrary. When the media start disparaging him is when you know he is saying things they don't want to give coverage and is a good sign. His move to throw more support behind those who believed in freedom of choice about the vaccines i believe to be a good move. Its something i think he was surprisingly slow to capitalise on originally,but with one of his candidates being a well known anti mandate doctor,it seems a good move to support the freedom of choice views that a significant part of the population have and that other parties,apart from perhaps act, have ignored. It was only a couple of months ago i was thinking a vote for nz first may be a wasted vote,but given the old winston seems to have re emerged at this stage,NZ first may have a chance after all.

I agree the media is driving a lot of the division,but unfortunately how they operate works.They see division as a tool to promote their views,then complain about the division they actually help create. Also,Many people are happy to think in the majority without giving any logical thought to what it is they are supporting. Respect for opposing views is disappearing and its the media and unfortunately politicians who are driving it. Christopher luxon weakness is a consequence of that,for it seems his first consideration before speaking is ,how will i be judged if i say this,instead of having the confidence to actually just say and do what he thinks is right. That ,in my opinion,is why national is not currently as popular as it should be. The recent shooting in auckland was another example of how the media approach the race subject,which they normally happily use to divide.. The samoans are now talking about the relationships between different pasifika groups,yet that got little coverage from mainsteam media as when it comes to that subject its only newsworthy if the shooter had been white.

Yes,its helping retain some on one hand but on the other hand is driving more away. The horses it helps are those who under the old system would have won 3-5 races and who the connections are happy to run every week to get back down in the ratings. The ones it hinders are those who would have won 1-2 races under the old system,who can win next to no money thereafter as soon as they win their first race because they are now running against better horses who have dropped to their grade or below. Also its now at a point where even the horses who may have won 3-4 races under the old system are needing to be trained by someone who will run them every week for 3 months to get the drop backs,as that initial win is placing them against horses who are better. So the upshot of all that is its unfair on people and their horses who fall into the latter categories and they will simply give up or sell,or sell before they even race. The rating system works well in the non win grade,but thereafter makes so many horses having their dirst win either uncompetitive,or uncompetitive until they have run unplaced for months. Just ask anyone with a horse after their first win ,what they think.Its leading to less of those horses being trained. I personally can''t understand why they can't run more races where stakes won are part of the conditions. One thing that is apparent if you walk around a racetrack and talk to the trainers and drivers. They recognise that its just as important for the industry to have people participating at all levels,top and bottom. Which goes back to the example of Sir Monty.The current system allows horses like rubys a delight or take after me,to drop back to the same grade they have won previously, within 6 starts. So why on earth should they not have some type of provision in the handicapping system for sir monty to drop back to a non win grade say 10 starts latter. lets face it,it took hom 50 starts to win his non win race,so no one with a non win horse is going to complain if they run against him when hes had the inevitable run of unplaced runs in his current grade.They do it in australia,but in nz they simply don't seem to care about his type.

Sir monty ran today. His rating was r40. His record- 50 starts for 1 win and 4 placings.$18,421 in stakes Compare that to the winner,rubys a delight-her record 100 starts for 7 wins and 26 placings and $85,650 in stakes. Yet sir monty was rated above rubys a delight.

Some claimed hrnz have only ever contributed next to nothing to the race. $150,000 seems a bit more than next to nothing. One area of increased funding which i think seems short sighted, is the $2 million one off payment entain have asked hrnz to put into 2yo racing. We all know that only a handful of stables and their connections will benefit. It seems very out of touch with where the industry would most benefit from extra funding. Also,when most had been assuming that hrnz was trying to encourage longevity in a racehorses career to compensate for the lack of numbers being bred,they are sending a contradicting message by prioritizing funding for2 year old racing. I know its easy to pick holes in these type of things,but to me the more you read where the funding has gone,the more you realise they are still trying to please everyone.

If you look at it from the point of view of the person with say a non win horse. Take a club like westport who would be classified as running low key meetings. Last year at christmas their non win races were run for the then required minimum of $10,000. Then they dropped to $9,000 for their march meeting because the stakes funding was cut by 10% just after christmas. Now it says they will be funded for $10,500. So in reality they have gone up $500 since the end of last year. That is assuming the club doesn't put the extra $500 into a higher class race on the day,which it says any club can. Some of the standard provincial meetings will get a $1,500 increase,but again it seems up to the club whether they put that to the non wins or whether they use it to put the stake of the higher class race on the day up.Again the stakes may not increase much,depending on which races they put the increase into. Thats what it says on the hrnz website. So in reality any increase is good,but nothing to get too excited over.

must be a hypothetical question. Has any horse ever won that many in nz ever?

I agree with a lot of that but there needs to be change to the initial rating a non win horse gets. Its a no brainer to me,but for some reason it hasn't been changed. Those who make up the handicapping rules need to be proactive and not 12 months behind the times reactive.