Special Agent

I can liken the money given to set the all weather tracks up to the cheapest part of a racehorse being it's purchase price. Due diligence was lacking in this exercise in the quest to gain these "state of the art" facilities. Without the subsidising from NZTR I can only assume the NZ AWT demise. In hindsight is NZTR shooting the industry in the foot by propping these tracks up? Field size already shows trainer and/or owner reluctance. I feel left to club maintenance only at least the southern most two would fold very quickly.

Can't help but notice the ironies. 1. The boys in charge of two iconic now failing and flailing clubs/tracks are both Tim's. 2. The northern Tim is wearing a LoveRacing jacket, when clearly his love is other horse power racing and real estate.

Agreed.

A very important point, in my opinion.

He's hit his straps now.

Kane Smith

Looking at the track surfaces at Otaki and Ellerslie the current curator at Otaki is doing a much superior job than whoever dares put their hand up at Ellerslie. Moving the Otaki WFA to Auckland really is a DUMB idea!! Probably won't be the last dumb idea coming out of headquarters I would suspect.

There is still no proof Cobalt is a performance enhancing drug. Interesting Brendon was given warning of an elevated Cobalt reading in 2022. Neither Peter McKenzie nor Graham Richardson were afforded this courtesy. The reading was definitely high and this is not the first time the expert veterinarian has suggested administration must have been very close to start time, which is ridiculous. To me there is a common denominator with Hemoplex being one of the administered drugs in more than this case. Assuming Hempoplex is sourced from a vet, there is some poor information handed onto the trainers.

I suppose they don't even have to be accountable with the donation from Auckland. I'm picking the jumps have sat gathering dust for the past 12 months.

"Support"? Pull the other one.

Ditto!!!!!!

Pardon my ignorance. I thought Stuart rode over fences. Did Amanda race ride too? I hope she gets to spend some quality time with her family. We bitch and moan about the racing fraternity but, you'd have to be proud of how everyone has rallied around to raise some much needed funds. Well done. Thoughts with Amanda and her young family.

Who can take those statistics as gospel? Of course the numbers of horses and trainers are down, not to mention jumping venues. What are they thinking to mention that Riccarton is the only South Island course to run jumping events? All by design and all to get rid of jumping completely. No decision to be made till 31 October?? Are we supposed to believe the decision has not already been made? The $400 jumps riding fee was easy to put in place because the jumping short term was already known.

There is no evidence that Cobalt is performance enhancing. There appears to be Cobalt in just about everything you can buy to promote the health of your horse which means prior to racing you have to knock off using tonics, iron supplements, mineral salts and salt licks. Interesting reading this week was the Geraldine based greyhound trainer Pringle who returned a Cobalt positive for using the cheaper Ironcyclen substitute which sits in the feed room of many racehorse trainers. Pick another trace element and maybe the RIB could change it's threshold too so Cobalt is not the most sought after positive offender.

Commissioned vs suggestion. "Largely" accepted and endorsed. Where did this come from? "Those at the coalface". Who? How many will stand up and be counted?

Is this a serious comment?

This all smacks of a poor attempt to force connections to the AWT's. With field restrictions alone, they are dreaming. Who is monitoring the actions of NZTR officials? When will they be accountable?

So what? It is winter time. I doubt 19mm would make the track unsafe. The jockey who tested the Taranaki track has enough experience to make a call on safety. Don't put rules in that NZTR have no intentions following. I have spoken to reliable people at both Hastings and Taranaki who think the tracks could have been raced on. Protocols are no good if they are not followed. What a joke, Taranaki moves to Hawera, ANOTHER TRACK NOT REQUIRED. Didn't Opunake move from Hawera for the better track in New Plymouth?

No gallops races anywhere in NZ for 7 days due to abandonments. Has anyone considered the cost to owners? Who knows how many more week's training fees will need to be paid before each horse gets back into a field??!! Pukekohe should have been rescheduled to Friday, and Hastings to Monday. Notice it is all the "flash" tracks that have had to abandon. Look at how the unwanted tracks such as Avondale, Foxton and Levin are handling large amounts of horses in a trialling capacity. It's not rocket science. Although a training, trialling and minor race filler AWT's are obviously not the answer. One wonders when those in charge will look in the mirror and make an honest appraisal. There will be more crude descriptions of our head honchos than Gai's "Mindless Marshmallows" referring to the Aussie equivalents.

Will this meeting suffer the same fate as Hastings?

A few in CD must have thought the same, having run a 3 horse trial prior to their last AWT meeting.

Depends on the quality of coaching.

LOL. Exactly how bad is the surface water, and drainage? There are no races tomorrow, Friday. Are there any images out there?

Monday??

This is fair comment.