Riccarton Track G3 or G2 or F1? 3 October 2020

[Chief Stipe]

I'm certainly not having a dig at Pitty.  As I've said before I have the utmost respect for his deeds as a trainer.  Certainly love it when the Pitman stable nabs a big one across the Strait.

My issue is with the state of our big turf tracks and the spending of $50m on three AWT'S when we have serious issues with our main turf tracks.

Ellerslie, Te Rapa, Trentham and Riccarton all have well documented issues yet there seems to be no strategy to address these issues.

Although it appears that is one of the reasons for confiscating racing club assets.

It all seems disjointed and either lacking transparency or financial planning/business casing.  

Yesterday's surface at Riccarton did not look good when viewing on Trackside.

[nomates]

I agree with all of the above , that is why we need a plan for the future , the next 20-50 years . All of the above tracks are past their used by dates , looking to the future we need built for purpose facilities that will future proof us . 

Will it happen , doubtful , probably a step too large for our esteemed leadership .

[Reefton]

4 hours ago, Chief Stipe said:

Were you being "entertained" in the Presidents bar Reefton?  

 

No I bloody wasn't. I never go near anyone's President's bar unless I am lucky enough to have a share in a winner and then invariably I am driving (as I was yesterday) so am not likely to overtax the entrainment budget. 

Re your photos I would be a bloody sight keener to see dust that clods at Riccarton and the comment about times slowing coincides with the longer races spending more time running into the wind down the back straight. This is a non debate in my view.

[Joe Bloggs]

3 minutes ago, Reefton said:

No I bloody wasn't. I never go near anyone's President's bar unless I am lucky enough to have a share in a winner and then invariably I am driving (as I was yesterday) so am not likely to overtax the entrainment budget. 

Re your photos I would be a bloody sight keener to see dust that clods at Riccarton and the comment about times slowing coincides with the longer races spending more time running into the wind down the back straight. This is a non debate in my view.

I'm sorry my learned friend, but it's a mass debate in IMO.

[Chief Stipe]

28 minutes ago, Reefton said:

about times slowing coincides with the longer races spending more time running into the wind down the back straight

Ok so the two 1400m races later in the day run two seconds slower than the maiden 1400m is due to the wind?

Either that or the maiden winner should be on a plane to OZ post haste.

In my opinion the track ran faster than a G3 and the clouds of dust and clods flying (albeit hard dry ones) didn't indicate a "track in good order" as you asserted.

[Pitman]

Why would you go to Oz when there is a $500k race on home track in 5 weeks and others to suit

Do you not think that the sand slitting done a few years ago would have something to do with the “dust”. There was nothing wrong with The track our 17 runners pulled up in good order

[Joe Bloggs]

Thats pitiful.......what about the others? just because yours escaped, how bloody selfish is that, I wouldn't expect anything less.

[Pitman]

You are a tosser

name one horse that went amiss

Big fields firm track fast times

NAME ONE

[billy connolly]

2 hours ago, Pitman said:

name one horse that went amiss

Live Drama, race 7.

Cleared to start by the half-baked officiating (female) Veterinary surgeon after going off in barrier stalls pre race.

This is an automatic late scratching anywhere else in the world, how did this woman score the top Vet job at Riccarton ???
 

[Chief Stipe]

9 hours ago, Pitman said:

Do you not think that the sand slitting done a few years ago would have something to do with the “dust”. There was nothing wrong with The track our 17 runners pulled up in good order

This isn't sand Pitty.  If you think that these pictures show a "track in good order" then you and many of us have a different definition of "good order"!

The clouds of dust didn't have anything to do with the track needing ripping in the last two weeks?  Probably because there was a hard pan of soil inhibiting drainage.

Can we see the actual penetrometer measurements?

[Freda]

All kudos to Pitty for his excellent record.   

However, the track has been the source of much concern since it was re-laid in 1998;  and I understand that twenty years is the general time frame for turf tracks to be renewed.    That hasn't happened, and isn't likely to with the AWT in sight.   [  I don't think some extra lateral drains that don't seem to work, or some occasional sand-slitting constitutes 'renewal' ]

Edited October 4, 2020 by Freda

[Joe Bloggs]

10 hours ago, Pitman said:

You are a tosser

name one horse that went amiss

Big fields firm track fast times

NAME ONE

Read the stipes report, if you're that literate, how many went poorly or the jock couldn't explain the performance, you don't need to go amiss to end up a cripple, or best case scenario, buggered for the rest of the season/campaign.......you don't think those horses and trainers will avoid your goat track....oh hang on, they don't have much alternative do they.......damned if they do, damned if they don't......the hole's getting bigger, keep digging.

[Reefton]

19 hours ago, Joe Bloggs said:

I'm sorry my learned friend, but it's a mass debate in IMO.

Mass debate???????  Strikes me a lot of people wanking on about nothing

The proof of the pudding will be in two then three weeks time when all these crippled horses will be no shows at the Ashburton and Riccarton Meetings

I just hope the two who beat mine on Saturday are both crocks so I can get a show at a decent lump of stake money

 

[Reefton]

18 hours ago, Chief Stipe said:

Ok so the two 1400m races later in the day run two seconds slower than the maiden 1400m is due to the wind?

Either that or the maiden winner should be on a plane to OZ post haste.

In my opinion the track ran faster than a G3 and the clouds of dust and clods flying (albeit hard dry ones) didn't indicate a "track in good order" as you asserted.

Maybe the wind dropped - I don't know and I didn't take any notice of the time comparisons but if it wasn't the wind drop what was it?  They didn't water the track during the day so how come the track got slower?

Though come to think of it didn't I hear Matt Cross say something in one of the latter races about them running the fast last 600 for the day but the slowest time for the full event?  Not sure what race it was but likely to have been a 1400 race.  

[Chief Stipe]

38 minutes ago, Reefton said:

Maybe the wind dropped - I don't know and I didn't take any notice of the time comparisons but if it wasn't the wind drop what was it?  They didn't water the track during the day so how come the track got slower?

Though come to think of it didn't I hear Matt Cross say something in one of the latter races about them running the fast last 600 for the day but the slowest time for the full event?  Not sure what race it was but likely to have been a 1400 race.  

The track deteriorated during the day - no doubt got drier - if a track gets too hard it doesn't translate into faster times.  However if you review the first two or three races there is very little dust thrown up.  But as the day progresses the clouds got bigger and bigger across the whole track.  This would indicate that the surface was breaking down and the grass root structure wasn't good enough to mitigate it.

Pitty's next champ in the first got the best of the track.  Just having a quick look at the videos the track was off from Race 4 onwards.

[Joe Bloggs]

1 hour ago, Chief Stipe said:

The track deteriorated during the day - no doubt got drier - if a track gets too hard it doesn't translate into faster times.  However if you review the first two or three races there is very little dust thrown up.  But as the day progresses the clouds got bigger and bigger across the whole track.  This would indicate that the surface was breaking down and the grass root structure wasn't good enough to mitigate it.

Pitty's next champ in the first got the best of the track.  Just having a quick look at the videos the track was off from Race 4 onwards.

Well thought out and articulated, the blind Thomas's don't get it, or don't want to, why? well you have to ask yourself that question.

[Chief Stipe]

44 minutes ago, Joe Bloggs said:

Well thought out and articulated, the blind Thomas's don't get it, or don't want to, why? well you have to ask yourself that question.

No need to make it personal Joe.  Some trainers are able to manage their horse's better than others when it comes to racing on firm surfaces.  I owned a horse that won the first Group race in NZ run on an F1.  She loved it!

My concern here is a multi-faceted one. 

1. I don't believe the track was a G3.  It was a G2 or maybe even faster as the day progressed;
2. The track turned to a dust bowl and the surface deteriorated - a sign that the underlying soil is stuffed and therefore grass growth is impeded;
3. The surface deteriorating PLUS its hardness would not be good for a horse.  There was an extensive debate on this forum and Channel X about the issues with horses breaking down at Te Rapa.  It was felt this was due to the inconsistency in the surface hardness due to the over use of sand to try and fix soil issues;
4. When it rains or irrigation is used then the water will not permeate into the soil in any depth.  Most will run off and the top will become greasy.  The Track Manager said in the video the moisture content of the track was 38% - it sure dried quick from that 38%.  With the soil stuffed the Track Manager has no buffer for management - he is going to have to be impossibly accurate with the irrigation regime.  Watch this space if there is inconsistency in application (has happened at Riccarton before) or unforecast shows on the day!;
5. The expenditure of $16m on an AWT when the main turf track needs work.  In my opinion the AWT will struggle to pay its way therefore where does the money come from to address the main turf track issues?  Other club asset acquisition?

As I've posted before many many times - Ellerslie, Te Rapa, Awapuni, Trentham all have similar issues.  I've been banging on about the issue since 2005 when I walked the Ellerslie track early one morning on a big Grp day.  I took the trainer out with me an hour or so later and he wished that he hadn't seen it as he would have scratched except for the fact we had travelled from the CD.  Nigel Tiley was with us and he immediately scratched his horse from one of the big races in which it was a favoured runner.  I have seen NOTHING done in the last 15 years to any of these Turf Track's to address the underlying issues apart from sand slitting.  Sand slitting is a short term fix that eventually comes unstuck - the sand drains away and you keep adding more and more - you don't see good turf growing at the beach!

I walked Te Rapa about 7 years ago and I could see the inconsistency in the surface then.  Good turf surface and then every now and then a sand pot hole.

[Pitman]

On 4/10/2020 at 12:12 PM, Chief Stipe said:

To be fair when comparing the times for the day the early times were exceptional but tended to be comparatively slower as the day progressed.  

Not the 1200m they got decidedly quicker

fillies race 1.07.90

Wekaforce 1.07.15

oh that’s right track was off!! don’t blame the wind!!

[Pitman]

18 minutes ago, Chief Stipe said:

 you don't see good turf growing at the beach!

 

Dubai??!! Sand ??

Edited October 5, 2020 by Pitman

[Chief Stipe]

3 minutes ago, Pitman said:

Not the 1200m they got decidedly quicker

fillies race 1.07.90

Wekaforce 1.07.15

oh that’s right track was off!! don’t blame the wind!!

I was looking at 1400m and further and trying to compare class of horse as well.  But regardless of the veracity of the time analysis I will stand by my opinion that the track was harder than G3 and did not stand up to racing very well.

[Chief Stipe]

11 minutes ago, Pitman said:

Dubai??!! Sand ??

Are you taking the piss Pitty?  Are you saying "just add water and the grass grows"?  They have to modify the sand with soil to enable grass to grow in it.

Did you know that UAE imports sand for building?  The desert sand isn't the right kind for making concrete with.  FACT!

Trivial Pursuit question for you Pitty - what by volume is the largest transported substance in the world?

[Joe Bloggs]

It's not personal chief, well, yes it is, as I said we lost a very good horse because of the track, I'd never have sent him south to run on a concrete pitch, he never recovered from that run, he had a knee op, wrong decision to send him there, my fault, but they are unprofessional to present tracks like they do.

The other half is still beating me up over it, he should have been here, he would have been more than handy. It's not the only track either, I'll give you that, I've been lucky enough to have trained on Flemington and Rosehill, and now here in QLD, I've got benchmarks, I get pissed when people argue when they have never trained or raced horses on our tracks, Riccarton is a joke, and adding an AWT to the joke is a bigger joke, and finally, I've had winners on G1 tracks in MEL and SYD, we had the fastest stayer in OZ in 91, when he broke the track record he smashed it, it was on a G1, so I'm not one eyed just upset that you could go into bat for a disgusting mess that is Riccarton, and nothing is done to rectify it.

For Gods sake, I trained more winners at Moonee Valley than any other metro track, I loved the place, but that was the old velodrome and now it's a beautiful strathayr, I'd love to take one down there, they knew what they had to do, they did it....not like this mob at CJC and NZTR.....they are lost souls, just wandering aimlessly.

[Pitman]

56 minutes ago, Joe Bloggs said:

It's not personal chief, well, yes it is, as I said we lost a very good horse because of the track, I'd never have sent him south to run on a concrete pitch, he never recovered from that run, he had a knee op, wrong decision to send him there, my fault, but they are unprofessional to present tracks like they do.

The other half is still beating me up over it, he should have been here, he would have been more than handy. It's not the only track either, I'll give you that, I've been lucky enough to have trained on Flemington and Rosehill, and now here in QLD, I've got benchmarks, I get pissed when people argue when they have never trained or raced horses on our tracks, Riccarton is a joke, and adding an AWT to the joke is a bigger joke, and finally, I've had winners on G1 tracks in MEL and SYD, we had the fastest stayer in OZ in 91, when he broke the track record he smashed it, it was on a G1, so I'm not one eyed just upset that you could go into bat for a disgusting mess that is Riccarton, and nothing is done to rectify it.

For Gods sake, I trained more winners at Moonee Valley than any other metro track, I loved the place, but that was the old velodrome and now it's a beautiful strathayr, I'd love to take one down there, they knew what they had to do, they did it....not like this mob at CJC and NZTR.....they are lost souls, just wandering aimlessly.

Sounds like you have been an exceptionally good trainer Why hide?

[Joe Bloggs]

I don't think I've been an exceptionally good trainer, I have tried to tell it like it is, the truth, to me and mine. I happen to disagree vehemently with you on several issues. It's my democratic right is it not? luckily, there are quite a few others on here that aren't afraid to disagree with you. You PM and attack me, nothing I have said is untrue, and I speak from the heart and the pocket, my missus is an Ozzie, she loved NZ racing and loved breeding horses there, until she realised what a sad future lay ahead, our couple of mil we invested there is a drop in the ocean in the big scheme of things and I'm happy to be back here watching the malaise from afar.

Sadly, the victims of our decision are the young trainer we had in the NI and a delightful and talented lady trainer in the SI.....plus, feed companies, transporters, vets, etc etc......it is people like you that are savage without reproach, unable to accept criticism from any quarter, and turn hostile when challenged.

I'm almost finished in racing, this tenure is my last throw at the stumps, I've loved my racing life and my corporate life and the time we spent owning and running an award winning travel and safari business. Many hurdles and speed bumps all over the world, negotiating business arrangements with Qantas, coordinating logistics for two FIFA World Cups, along with Wallaby and All Black supporters tours to Europe and the African and South American continents, so, arguing with you on a public forum is not my ideal way to enjoy my racing experience.

I don't wish you ill, just hope you can gain a little humility and concede that we are all entitled to our opinions, especially those that can offer case or life experiences that support facts stated.

Joe.

 

[Reefton]

6 hours ago, Joe Bloggs said:

I don't think I've been an exceptionally good trainer, I have tried to tell it like it is, the truth, to me and mine. I happen to disagree vehemently with you on several issues. It's my democratic right is it not? luckily, there are quite a few others on here that aren't afraid to disagree with you. You PM and attack me, nothing I have said is untrue, and I speak from the heart and the pocket, my missus is an Ozzie, she loved NZ racing and loved breeding horses there, until she realised what a sad future lay ahead, our couple of mil we invested there is a drop in the ocean in the big scheme of things and I'm happy to be back here watching the malaise from afar.

Sadly, the victims of our decision are the young trainer we had in the NI and a delightful and talented lady trainer in the SI.....plus, feed companies, transporters, vets, etc etc......it is people like you that are savage without reproach, unable to accept criticism from any quarter, and turn hostile when challenged.

I'm almost finished in racing, this tenure is my last throw at the stumps, I've loved my racing life and my corporate life and the time we spent owning and running an award winning travel and safari business. Many hurdles and speed bumps all over the world, negotiating business arrangements with Qantas, coordinating logistics for two FIFA World Cups, along with Wallaby and All Black supporters tours to Europe and the African and South American continents, so, arguing with you on a public forum is not my ideal way to enjoy my racing experience.

I don't wish you ill, just hope you can gain a little humility and concede that we are all entitled to our opinions, especially those that can offer case or life experiences that support facts stated.

Joe.

 

If it(NZ Racing) is that big a disaster why take any interest in it?  If Aussie is so far superior I am astonished you even give NZ racing a second glance.  We have a two(?) time NZ premiership winning trainer saying he saw no issues with the track and reporting that all his horses came through unscathed and generally jumping out of their skin the next day(including a two year old which was probably the most at risk of the lot)  but all the experts are bagging it.  I know who's opinion I would listen to.

I think your unease about the AWT at Riccarton is spilling over into being critical about every thing there.  I am wary about the AWT too but that track on Saturday was OK.  The proof will be how many races they run in three weeks if all these horses are jarred up.  Pitty will be rubbing his hands together since he is apparently the only trainer from Saturday with horses that were able to walk on Sunday morning. 

 As I said I would have that track every day over the shit hole that Riccarton quickly turns into with a shower of rain.