Bloke

Get the spelling right TAB. It's Jaffa! Just a further F----- Aucklander

Mate I do not follow rugby. Besides in Wellington, Football has been the dominate sport for many years and Football is now NZs largest team sport in terms of participation The Wellington Men's Rugby Team has to play their games at Porirua Park in front of maybe 100 spectators. The Hurricanes and the Wellington Rugby Union have major financial issues and with any luck they will fold.

Well, they did not help themselves by having a lamb as a mascot for a Rugby Team and calling their Basketball team The Rams. I also must give TAB some credit, usually anyone who comes from Christchurch is normally a pain in the arse parochial. Not only that he has turned Jaffa.

I do not agree with your comments that the Awapuni cock ups were beyond the prediction of most investors. Firstly, they had no experience with property development so should have sought advice. For the sale of the Awapuni land it was simple. They should have firstly subdivided, then sold the sections and finally built the conference centre. That way they would have removed the risk So far as Club Management goes, Race has been a chapter of incredible cock ups. Just look at recent years. They bought the land at Sherrif's Road Awapuni for $1.6M as they though it would be good for stables. Only problem was that once again they did not do their due diligence as there was a stream around the land with a bridge which they thought gave them access. But it didn't so the last I heard was that the land was back on the market for offers of near $1M. They started a Cafe at Trentham which has cost a fortune to set up and for the first 8 or months of operation lost around $70k. Then we find the CEO's brother in-law is the chef. Once again poor research as there is an excellent Cafe across the railway line which attracts the foot traffic. ]

Race's problem goes back to "The Awapuni Debacle" when they built a conference centre / grandstand without any money. The plan was to subdivide residential land at Awapuni, sell sections and then build the new centre. However, they decided to build before they sold the land and the $9M cost was funded by the Bank with the debt to be repaid from section sales. The building was completed just as the GFC hit and they could not find buyers for the sections. When they did sell a section well below expected price the proceeds were used to only repay interest to The Bank. So, Trentham has been sold off to repay interest and principal as well as to cover the many other blunders made by so called experts. The other issue they have is that each club has two directors on the board but some of the clubs are so small in terms of membership that it would be incredibly hard to find two members with the expertise to sit as directors. For example, Marton has about 20 members plus the committee. Rangitikei and Feilding are not much better.

Maybe but I don't fancy their chances be of surviving financially given Race's appalling history.

At the last AGM, Masterton members showed common sense and rejected a proposal to join Race. Some misguided fool in the club moved the motion. That is the only reason I can think of to give them an award.

I stand to be corrected but I think you stated that you were a former Christs student. Also, your hometown of Christchurch wasn't any better prior to the earthquakes. I took my youngest down in 2009 when she started at Canterbury Uni and at the initiation, they warned the students not to go into town at night. The central city was filthy, and I went for a coffee just off the square in what appeared to be a reasonable Cafe and then a fight started up between two women and they rolled around on the floor for some time before it was broken up. I was there a few weeks ago and they have done a great job rebuilding the city. Shame that it needed an earthquake though.

Well according to Sam Neil, students at Christs College were the same as you describe above

You forgot to mention your old school, Christs College!

It's simple Football has taken over in both Wellington and Auckland and it is the dominate sport by a country mile. Rugby should be Club based as Football is. Top Footballers are not playing for first Eleven because the standard is poor, and Rugby needs to follow. There are many Colleges that cannot field a Rugby team and if they can many do not have the coaches with the expertise. There still are the "Try Hard" colleges that want to win trophies and poach kids from other schools and encourage some to stay in school when they're 19 just to win trophies. What amazes me is that Wellington has won the NPC for two of the last three years and the game is so small in Wellington.

Rugby league is so small in terms of participation it can hardly be used as any example. There are many towns that cannot field a team and in Wellington there is a total of 16 senior Rugby league teams. That is about the same as a medium sized Football club in Wellington Rugby is all but dying in Auckland and Wellington and they are still operating an NPC which attracts only a handful of spectators in most provinces, and it is costing a fortune. Their model is totally screwed.

Was he not the CEO at Hastings when they spent $7M on two blocks of land only to find later that they had not done due diligence as the land was zoned for Horticulture / Viticulture, not a racetrack?

Brings back bad memories of the Terrible Trio. Allen, Glenda Hughes and Nathan Guy. None of them knew anything about racing and they were running the show. The classic was Guy when Mike Pitman told him that Christchurch needed an all-weather track and Guy's reply was that they already had an all-weather track, Addington

If you wish to view the financial Accounts of a particular Club, just go online to The Companies Office and look under Incorporated Societies, which almost all Racing Clubs are and then type in the name of the Club.

Yes, I do agree with you occasionally TAB. I must admit though Masterton is a head scratcher.

There won't be much to sell. All that "Race" owns now is the track and the stables

Yes, you are a Coaster, and they are normally great people. I am looking forward to visiting there again in the next couple of weeks, Hokitika, Black Ball, Westport, Reefton etc. Most Wellingtonians travel over the hill on the day of the races. It is only an hour and a half from Wellington and 30 minutes from Upper Hutt. On January 2 the first arrive at 6am to get their car park and set up for breakfast. They have a camping ground which is packed on the night before and the night of the races. There is also accommodation on course. The only place which is not full on race day is the Members area of the main stand. Most want to be under the trees.

Spoken like a true accountant. TAB no doubt you would have prepared some extravagant Cash Flow Forecasts in your time.

Rubbish! Most are from the Wairarapa and Wellington. I have never met a Jaffa at Tauherenikau. Come down and see for yourself. Even you should be impressed

Unfortunately, Ellerslie has a history of embellishing, so I am unsure as to what to believe. For the last 20 years their market has been the posers and those who want to get pissed and pay a fortune for the privilege. Prior to that they had a fantastic New Year's Day meeting for The Auckland Cup and got large crowds which reflected a cross section of the community Racing cannot survive if you are only targeting one segment of the market. If you want to a see decent crowd perhaps TAB, you should travel down to Tauherenikau for either their January 2 or Waitangi Day meetings. I can assure you that you will learn heaps. They don't need TBGP, massive TV advertising and TAB promotions to get their crowds. However, imagine if those resources were put into the two Tauherenikau meetings.

It was a good day's racing but if the crowd was, so "O for Awesome" why was there large empty seating in the two main stands? For a city of 1.5M, the crowd was 10k max, so it is still a poor crowd given all the effort that has gone into the day. Until ATR learns how to market to and attract a cross section of the community to the races, I can see it getting no better. ATR used to have a magnificent Cup Day, but it was screwed and now they are trying to re-invent the wheel. TAB are you involved with The ATR? If you are then good on you for looking to improve the industry.

I was alluding to the whole day's racing. There are some massive stakes apart from the raffle race. No problem with marketing but at least they can be honest ("14 Champions" is just more hyperbole). Reminds me of Weaver, The Auckland Cup run on a Wednesday according to him was going to be "The Race That Stopped Two Nations"

It sounds like a good day but how many champions will be there? I cannot think of any. The TV Ad says there will be 14 in the The Raffle Race which is clearly a false claim and makes our industry look stupid. Also, will the cost of this be worth it?

Just imagine what the cost to income will be for the so-called Champions' Day.