The Centaur

You make some excellent points. When racing was based around the open handicap first leg of a double and the open sprint it meant the majority of public had something identifiable to follow. Every now and then a new high flyer would emerge adding interest to the mix. Its just too much for the public given time restraints too follow all the lower grade racing. The open grade racing in the deep south although not encouraged by the racing hierarchy still enjoys some enthusiasm even though many of the horses are castoffs from the north. Look at the huge tech companies around today. Many were start ups from a garage or bedroom. The point is the great ideas come from the grassroots and not from the highly overpaid suited managers. Why a TAB CEO should be on $700,000 per years is just crazy. The craziness filters right down the industry. All the time those with the ideas can't get heard because those creaming the dollars would feel inadequate if the idea didn't come from them.

Who knows? My issue based on this definition.... A conflict of interest arises when a member's duties, or responsibilities to the Board, are (or might reasonably be perceived to be) affected by some other interest, relationship or duty that may not be in the Board's best interests. Perceived conflict must be managed in the same way as an actual conflict.

In some aspects dogs are competing with horse racing. If you are on the board of any enterprise its inappropriate to be promoting for a fee the opposition. If thats the extent of a board members commitment they shouldn't be there.

Bruce Sherwin now doing the dog commentating. Thats a huge conflict of interest after all isn't he on the board at NZTR.

Maybe they get confused with depreciation and cash available. For instance the wonderful $50 million betting platform virtually worthless the day it was commissioned.

People attend racing this time of year for reasons other than gambling or viewing horse flesh. Therefore its important to spread the horses far and wide and not have the absurdity of say Matamata with 12 races. The other factor is presentation. The greyhounds seem to have wriggled their way into programming by wrapping their product around midweek gallops often restricting gallop TV presentation by cutting into galloping time. In December there were 39 greyhound TAB meets in New Zealand compared to 27 galloping meetings. Further more the dog presenter is now the "voice" of TAB betting on gallops. All the while NZTR keeps hiring more staff. If only just one of them would advise the TAB on presentation.

JB. The way law works is that judges listen to expert opinion. So here it is. NB Dr McLean no relation to the other McLean Dr McLean said there was no evidence of the horses exhibiting pain when struck on the treadmill, but that thoroughbreds would not be able to do so while galloping. He told the court he could not say whether an electric charge was applied to the horses, only that a device was applied. Dr McLean said the device used in the video appeared to be a normal hand-held prodder that was available for use on cattle. "Unless I felt the surge myself, no-one can be sure (if electricity was used)," he said. "When horses are moving (on a treadmill), all they can do is keep moving. They can't go faster because they'd crash." Chief Steward Robert Cram faced the committal hearing and was questioned about his analysis of the footage. Victoria Police allege that the Weir-trained gallopers Yogi, Red Cardinal and Tosen Basil were hit with a conducted energy device while running on a treadmill and wearing blinkers on October 31. Mr Cram was asked whether he saw the horses react or suffer any pain. "I can't answer that for the horse, but I believe it was being used on them," Mr Cram said. "I didn't see the horses react."

By needing to twist the argument you are losing. Where have I said I condone "jiggering"? For your deafness and closed mindedness I will reiterate. I consider the punishment to Weir has been well and truly sufficient and taken nobly by him.

Your argument is illogical. You say Weir is a cruel bastard. Maybe you assume the thousands who shared in the ownership of horses trained by him, the staff fellow participants all were ignorant. There is no way he would have risen to the heights he did if was "a cruel bastard". Have a bit sense. All you are doing is getting on a self righteous bandwaggon with no on the ground knowledge.

Its when someone can't present a rational argument they resort to personal abuse. Maybe you consider capital punishment as an appropriate penalty. After all the financial cost to Weir has been massive.

Joe Bloggs You are totally over the top with your comments. Weir to his credit was willing to plead guilty 3 years ago but instead dubious charges of conspiracy to defraud were laid. For heavens sake having a $50 bet in the Melbourne Cup was deemed by some as "conspiracy" There are far worse instances of cruelty around than Weir's so lets have some consistency. Given the number of horses Weir was responsible for his "rap sheet" as you describe it I thought was quite stellar.

Does "raceday" actually need horses? If Boxing Day at Awapuni had plenty attractions planned perhaps with some added attractions the event could proceed with say large screen hooking directly into Trentham.

In all this track talk I hear no mention of Woodville. Why is that?

JB. Rather than start a new thread I thought I'd catch you here. Sad to hear about passing of Ronnie Franklin recently. You must have known him early days in Hawera. I note his first winner was Bravata at Marton 1973. He won for me in 1975. I'll always remember that day.

More legal stupidity. Whats to stop a jockey telling his wife and the wife passing on the info down at the hair salon. Sure discourage this behaviour but hardly worth all the legal clap trap.

When it comes to Ready To Run clubs should be involved and receive income. After all its racing infrastructure that is used to educate these horses. NZB should not have a monopoly particularly online. NZTR has the data to generate breeding catalogues. Just needs some initiative.

One thing with social media such as this is that whenever a suggestion is made its met with total indifference but plenty are willing to complain. As I have said the best way is a petition to reduce the judicial/integrity costs. OK $1m total cost maybe a bit unrealistic but aiming for 50% reduction certainly viable. Better use of video conferencing, return of honorary officials are some of the ways to achieve cost reductions and off course removal of bloated salaries and fees.

You forget that the whole purpose of racing was for social reasons. Gambling should only be secondary. People do go to the races over summer. If they don't it can be poor weather on the day or poor marketing. Trentham should have had a bumper crowd. During the week when a local race had finished instead of giving TV viewers insane greyhound ramblings there should have been build up for the Saturday meeting. Thats just one, even minor instance. There are so many ways to get people oncourse. If I was given half a chance there would be at least 10,000 ontrack.

During COVID lockdowns there was a reawakening of online conferencing. It could be possible through technology to have experts based in Australia officiating over racing in New Zealand. Therefore the key to attacking the massive RIU and judicial costs is forcing the use of technology. First Step: With this in mind there needs to be someone with a current profile to introduce a petition for signing by jockeys, trainers and owners. Judicial costs should be no more than $1M per year.

Summertime is about getting people on track. If that means twilight then YES. If Saturday then YES. If mixing trots and gallops the YES. If More meetings less horses then YES. There are plenty betting options available everyday of the week so no need to program everything around betting.

This week is Fieldays week. Date changed this year. To illustrate your point I doubt NZTR know how to leverage the thoroughbred industry around the event. There are numerous ways e.g. grabbing some of the exhibitors for sponsorship and free space at major meetings.

One of the things to make an event of it could be to have a reasonable large screen. As the role of the TAB Christmas at the Races is to supply marquees to clubs then perhaps they could hire reasonably large screens to private functions and I repeat some exclusive livestreaming. Can't see any problem in that.

Somewhere in all that is a formula which a club could cooperate and licence outside functions. Perhaps some exclusive livestreaming to add to the day.

Radical?... who on earth put that word in. NZTR wouldn't know what the word meant never alone how to spell it. It seems NZTR is trying to deflect blame on to the club. NZTR is in charge of racing therefore they should have had someone qualified on the ground doing inspections and other duties ensuring safety of all participants. If they want be radical how about standing up to the TAB particularly on the televising of racing. NZTR need to extract Trackside TV from TAB setting up a stand alone media organization which would make TAB easier to close down or sell off. NZTR should be pushing the changes to legislation to allow clubs to run their own pools which can be combined with marketing efforts.

Retiring???? That's silly. He's just starting to get a fan club.