Freda

But we don't really have tiered racing, only tiered stakes

Hell yeah, those questions are cringeworthy.

Fair points W, but still unacceptable for mine. Professional standards my arse. Language is one defining difference of our species. It's sobering when the immigrant folk I converse with on a daily basis speak better English than we do.

Much appreciated, thanks Chief.

Mine too.

It's not like you to be cynical, C...🤣

Agree, the jumping was fantastic and it is so sad that it has disappeared from the south altogether. As well, it gives those horses who may lack the necessary speed/class on the flat to have a viable career there, but with abundant courage, agility and stamina, can go on to be stars in a slightly different milieu.

I don't think being realistic is negative at all. If more folk faced reality instead of dancing around like every day from here on is Christmas, there might be some will to achieve real change. But at the moment the rose-tinted specs are firmly in place.

I have to relate a wee story in this context. When we campaigned horses on the Coast, we used to stay - horses too - at the farm of Ikamatua farmer and trainer Bill Kennedy. I was privileged to have made the acquaintance of Bill and his wife and children, he was one of the wisest men I have ever met and still I think, in some situations, what would Bill say about this? As a young and rather green horseperson, with an eventing background initially, I was a bit taken aback, to say the least, to find that Bill would routinely put down his retired racehorses - unless they were mares he wished to breed from. After good-naturedly putting up with my objections, he related the following. Cynthia and I were going to Greymouth for our weekly shop, he said, and for some reason we went via Blackball. No idea why, we just did. On the way, we passed an emaciated horse tethered in the scrub on the side of the road with a chain around its neck. Cynthia recognised the horse immediately. I didn't agree with her, but she wouldn't keep quiet about it so we went back the same way. Stopped and had a closer look, found to our horror that it had brands, which showed clearly that it was the Gatekeeper gelding I had given away to a 'good home'. I got the float, took a pair of boltcutters and went back and picked him up. Put a rug on him, fed him up and when he looked and felt better, took him down to the cattle yards and shot him. He looked at me and said, from then on, when the good life is finished, they're finished. My horses will never know a hungry day or an unkind word.

For training surface consistency, yes..and by allowing horses to be trained and raced over months when wet tracks are a problem to some, there is certainly a benefit for those horses being maintained in training. So, definitely worth the investment from the perspective of owners/trainers. But I'm not sure whether Winston's ideas went as far as training conditions, rather he was focused on race day abandonments. And, as we know that race days cost more than they generate in betting revenue, 'saving' a lost day merely costs more, rather than helping the overall malaise. And what will happen when these tracks need re-surfacing? Does Entain ride to our aid again? How long will there be a bucket of dosh without any accountability?

..and then we have The Cossack.....

Clearly, yes.

The posted report implies McNab and Nishizuka underwent veterinary examinations and were cleared of aabnormalities. One assumes the horses were the subject of the vet checks. Dunno who provides this gobbledygook.

And me, partially...family farms, work experience....I travelled to Oamaru races on one occasion with a transport company, on the way back we stopped off at a 'facility' out the back of Timaru to drop off a hapless animal. Open 44 gallon drums of blood sat outside, several horses, a goat with a broken leg and a few scraggy sheep were picking their way around rolls of wire netting in a fenced area [ couldn't call it a paddock] and this thoroughbred was offloaded and shoved in with them. I used to go possum shooting with mates on the Coast in behind Inchbonnie, and deer shooting with another friend around Mt Thomas. I can assure you, Chief, I'm not sentimental or unrealistic but the horror I saw at Timaru that day made me sick. A dedicated facility for horses is long overdue. Recently, a young re-homer came under the radar of some woke wankers because she had a number of horses on her property that were deemed ' too light in condition'. Feeding them was costing her a fortune but she wasn't getting any assistance to do that. They were not suitable for rehoming but was apparently having real trouble getting permission to put them down. Not all horses - or dogs - are suitable to be sport horses or pets.

Chickens and roosting and so on.

Laurie Sutherland.

A very much needed option.

Hmm, yeah. Facilities for horses very average, they do their best as I alluded, with very little help but it isn't a venue that too many enjoy. However their groundsman [ Snooky Cowan ] aided by Jeff McLaughlin and the committee members have, in recent times, produced a very good track. Despite last week's rare mistake Timaru is vastly superior as a venue on all counts.

Yes. Taxpayers' money too which doesn't sit well with me, given the level of subsidisation the industry gets already. But the Racing Minister was misinformed by those whom he could reasonably have expected to have had some idea. And that funding was specifically for AWT's.

Basically dead ? it IS dead, no jumping at all apart from the Nationals propped up by northern horses.

Ha..no, you're not mistaken, 'tis I indeed. Fortune? Silly bugger..! Sadly, no, it was a knockdown [ or a do-up ] when I bought it more years ago than I care to admit, and I've never had the means to renovate. Great years, good BBQ's, interesting flatmates from overseas as well as locals, many tales told tall and otherwise, but the old place can't hang in much longer. New building rules and regulations make a complete renovation simply prohibitive, the presence of asbestos not a great help either..so it's gone. Developers the purchasers. No gold toilet either. Any toilet will be fine, as will a roof that doesn't leak, windows that don't ice up in the winter, a power bill several hundred less than the one I have now...and space for the dogs. Simple.

I think there was an issue a month or more back with their pump, so lack of irrigation probably unavoidable. Along with the water shortage things no doubt very difficult to manage. No water at all would have been safer although not the ideal scenario.

A shambles of monumental proportions whatever way you look at it. It almost makes one think that the normally reliable Timaru team was lacking their very competent driver...was he unwell? unavailable? or was he under pressure from another source perhaps? and why, if so, would that be necessary? Anyone who can read should have been aware that drought conditions have been prevailing in South Canterbury . What concerns me most however, is the blatant untruth posted on the NZTR website. At which point did the undisputable fact that irrigation was applied and had been from at least the beginning of the week, become ' irrigation nil' ? That is a very serious matter, IMO.

Timaru has been held up as an example of good management, and it has seemed as if NZTR have at last come to accept what an important venue Timaru is. Talk about shooting yourselves in the foot, you clowns. Irrigation nil, no rainfall, stated all week on the website...yet the rating goes out from a 5 to a six ? how? I was told last week that the K-lines were out, and a trainer was told yesterday morning that the groundbreaker had been used, AND irrigation applied. So, obviously, untruths have been published, and well and truly come back to bite them in the arse.

At one time- in my memory certainly- the Owners and Trainers Federation was one entity. They then split into the two bodies, presumably because it was felt the aims of each were not mutually inclusive. At that time the Trainers Assn did do some very good work, much of that taken for granted today. Not sure what the Owners Federation achieved, not that I had anything to do with it but certainly nothing revolutionary comes to mind. Apathy, older folk having 'done their bit' and younger ones too blase to bother, left the TA very underfunded. So NZTR added a levy on licence fees to support the TA. Needless to say, that concept went down like a lead parachute. Very unethical many felt. Certainly at the moment, despite secretary Wendy Cooper being both helpful and efficient, the overall use of the outfit seems questionable.