Brodie

Your name is appropriate Mr Cock!!!

You what??? Ranga, you would be better off back on The Darkside, if all you want to be is an eff wit!

Get a life Ranga! You are the trollster!

It is blatantly obscene that salaried workers at the NZ TAB are earning far more than the Prime Minister of NZ. Could someone please advise us as to what they do to deserve the massive salaries that come from punters losses!!

He did win a probationary or junior drivers championship at Addington! I remember reading about it, and he didn’t come from a racing family from what I recall

Yeah he was. He won a probationary or juniors championship, what exactly not sure but he was a very good young driver. Not going to debate it with you anymore Ranga, cos you just trolling however he clearly has not carried on to any degree in racing. My point is a very good and championship winning driver is basically out of the industry, unless you can advise us all of him training a big team or driving plenty of horses!

You may well be right Flag, It was awhile ago but he did win something and it was not lotto. He clearly had ability to qualify if it was an interdominion probationary drivers comp and basically lost to the industry.

It was awhile ago but I am pretty sure he was the leading probationary one year

Not taking any piss Ranga! Brodie tells it the way it is

Boobybec, yes you are correct, and that has always been the way in harness racing. There are many trainers and drivers that come from racing families that haven’t been as successful as they should’ve, but not going to name them on here. There are many Junior drivers that were very promising but have more or less left the industry as not able to make a career out of it financially. Graeme Ward, is the first name that comes to mind. Our top Junior many years ago and was promising and think he has only had one or two horses at the races as a trainer. Once out of his time as a Junior or probationary driver seemed to be lost from harness. There are others as well but they know that there is not enough money in it for them unfortunately. Ben Hope has improved immensely from when he first drove and yes there was some talk, but I believe he has a good future in the game as he is keen and forever learning and pretty grounded I would say. We all should wish him and all our young ones coming thru the very best as we need them to continue in the game

It is interesting just how many ex South Island horses are now racing in the North Island currently. It is a trend that has come in more over the past couple of years. Very few horses come down from the North Island to race in the South Island and stay. The amateur race at Cambridge race 1 has a field of 10 and at least 6 of them started their careers in the South Island. All of them had probably met their mark in the South and so have been sold to race up north where they would be more competitive, which is good. Without them there wouldn’t be amateur races by the look of it in Cambridge, although Tim Vince is a great supporter of them.

Meant to be Kopia, sorry.

Tough crowd on here, criticising young Ben Hope. Considering Ben won the Junior driver best UDR award last month, would tend to suggest that the criticism is not really warranted. Anyway, not worth arguing about, our young drivers don’t need negative talk about them, when we need more of them in the industry, for it to continue. I aM sure Ben will continue to drive plenty of winners and let us see in a years time how he has gone?

Reefton if you are an accountant then you will know the lingo. However, you are both correct but saying things differently. Yes the amount wagered you class as turnover but it is not the amount that the TAB receives to pay out their expenses, so I would tend to agree with the others as the total wagered is not the TABs to claim!!!!!!

Dark Beau, you are entitled to your opinion but I totally agree with Konica! This Coalition government has done nothing positive to help racing in the 2 years that it has been in power! No need to use expletives in reply either.

Centaur, do you know what Mr John Allen did for his $650k plus salary? Yes he may have gone to meetings around the country but what does he actually do to warrant that amount of money? Punters that are allowed to offload with the NZ TAB pay his and other execs salaries from their losses. What is it that the TAB executives actually do each and every day?

Thanks for your reply Galah. I have not bothered at all with the KPC online comp at all this year but I see it was $200 over 10 races and a minimum of only $20 per race. The fact that it was over harness, dogs and gallops possibly took the gloss off it for normal harness punters. I agree that it would’ve been possible to start on the 1st or second race at Methven, although when Addington had the punters comp often the first race was often pretty early and difficult for some punters who work to at least 5 pm, so you won’t suit everyone. When Addington held the KPC oncourse there were often bets of $1k plus put on which totally changed the odds dramatically and not worth the risk. Does anyone know how successful the online KPC has been this year as I have not heard anything about it! One issue I have with it this year is the small amount of $200 for the heats and then the qualifiers I believe have to stump up with $5k and spend $500 on each and every race in the final which some may well find difficult!

Galah, firstly I think Addington normally had something like $500 or $600 starting stake for their KPC. Methven probably started on the 4th race to give more people time to get oncourse, I haven’t competed in a punting comp for awhile now for a couple of reasons, however when betting on the tote alone it distorted the tote dividends so much it was not funny, not that it worried the club as they got their %. If a contestant wanted to have a decent go say $1000 or two into the pool would shorten the dividend up,so much that ultimately it wasn’t worth backing it. What is the point of offloading and risking a large amount to get basically your money back??? I think that punting comps are a good idea to increase turnover and that is always good for the Club and racing. The Fixed odds that the KPC had for a short while I understand has now been canned.

NZ punters need oncourse Bookies, so that there is competition for the NZ TAB, who at the moment has a monopoly for gambling on racing and sports! The customer has suffered substantially over the past few years due to the lack of competition to the NZ TAB. Could someone please advise us who determined that Mr John Allen was worth over $650k per annum salary and what did he do for that that large amount?

I would hope that harness racing was in a strong position in 10 years time, but I would be very surprised if it was, if the business decisions being made continued along the same lines. Harness racing needs several things to make it successful and if one of the cogs disappears then racing is stuffed. It needs owners and I doubt there are too many new owners coming into the sport as the returns just aren’t there. It needs trainers and there are a few very good young ones coming thru at the moment, But I would say that it would be very difficult to make a great living out of it nowadays with costs and stakemoney having not increased from probably 20 years ago. Domination of the major stakes races by one stable is also a major negative for owners and trainers wanting to invest into an industry with very poor returns for most! It needs the right people in the business making the right decisions whether it be the racing clubs or TAB, and most of us know that there have been many blatantly stupid decisions made in recent years. Finally, we need the racing product to be interesting enough for both existing and new punters to be able to bet on the product and with the NZ TAB not interested in allowing everyone to offload, racing is going to be facing major headwinds!!!!

If I aren’t going to TABs Flag, they ain’t going to get “the kid” What are they after me for now, not offloading? If I was working for the NZ TAB I would be encouraging punters to have a go. The odds are always in their corner, but the fact is that the big boys are making blatantly dumb decisions to stop punters from offloading. I am aware of several other punters who have lost interest in both going to the track and betting. Racing has never been in such a precarious position before and the so-called betting platform that they paid mega millions has not been the success that the hierarchy at the TAB said it would be.

I have warned you previously about looking over my fence! Would not think true money launderers would be bothered with $20 notes! I see someone in Auckland has been fined $4 million today for money laundering sending money overseas, something like over 5 thousand transactions. News for the NZ TAB, it is not NZ punters that are winning 1k or wanting to put on 1k that are money launderers! Sooner they come out and tell us why they brought in the pathetic 1k limit the better, however they won’t because they aren’t exactly honest nowadays.

Better than the other way around Hunter? Haven’t had a bet for ages although I did really like Momentous, as it was thrown in off the front and on the grass. Been watching races on Trackside but while the NZ TAB have weak Tossers making the decisions they are to kill off racing, I just can not be bothered. Racing is going to die a long slow death While people that have no business sense are making the decisions. Gallops are knackered as well going by some of the stakes that they are racing for especially in the South Island. Does anyone know how much it is to have a galloper trained nowadays???

Chief, you and Globe are correct, and anyone with half a brain will know that the reason for the $1000 limit has nothing at all to do with the Anti Money Laundering Act!!!! It is that the TAB wants total control over punters which they now have. They accept bets from losing punters and if you are a more astute punter they just won’t Let them win, and they will do anything to stop them. Then they wonder why turnover is dropping off! Have you also noted how short the tote dividends are now and most of the time it just isn’t worth betting on the tote. The NZ TAB wouldn’t care if harness racing disappeared as they rely on sports betting nowadays to pay the salaries of the overpaid execs!!!