Waverley Races 28 July 2022 - Abandoned

[curious]

So, the only consideration for transferring the first and last day flat races if necessary is to the AWT? Not another grass track? If trainers were already concerned, that will ring even more alarm bells.

[Doomed]

2 minutes ago, curious said:

Looks like they have gone into a last minute panic!

GRAND NATIONAL FESTIVAL OF RACING
FIRST DAY ON THE TURF
Contrary to rumours that seem to be travelling the length and breadth of New Zealand the first day of the Grand National Festival HAS NOT been transferred to the Polytrack.
The First and Third days of the festival have been scheduled to run on the Turf Course Proper and that remains the intention.
The only reason for the Club and NZTR to justify a shift would be if the Turf was for some reason unusable or unsafe for racing. That is not the case.
Kind regards

Surely there should have been another sentence at the end of that statement. "If it was necessary to transfer the meeting it would be moved to a nearby course with a grass track, as visiting trainers would be anticipating a meeting on a wet grass track". 

[Doomed]

I wonder where Tim heard all the rumours? There has been no mention of it being moved on here and this place would be one of the first to hear if there were such rumours.

[nomates]

1 hour ago, Doomed said:

I have just seen the notice you are referring to. I am staggered. It is probably no secret I think the CJC are incompetent and arrogant, and NZTR....well, probably much the same, but I really did think both bodies would have been sitting back smugly for weeks thinking "everyone thinks we have cocked up, but we know almost exactly how many jumpers are targetting Riccarton".

Mate they never think about whether people think have cocked up , too conceited for that .

[nomates]

57 minutes ago, curious said:

So, the only consideration for transferring the first and last day flat races if necessary is to the AWT? Not another grass track? If trainers were already concerned, that will ring even more alarm bells.

Do you notice the only person not concerned about that being a reality , for no other reason that they don't understand the implications , is Mills himself .

What are the chances that they run 2/3 races on Saturday and turn around and say the track is unusable , so options are can the rest or race on the A/W .

[nomates]

58 minutes ago, Doomed said:

Surely there should have been another sentence at the end of that statement. "If it was necessary to transfer the meeting it would be moved to a nearby course with a grass track, as visiting trainers would be anticipating a meeting on a wet grass track". 

Don't want to go giving options that you don't want to follow thru on .

[Joe Bloggs]

1 hour ago, nomates said:

Do you notice the only person not concerned about that being a reality , for no other reason that they don't understand the implications , is Mills himself .

What are the chances that they run 2/3 races on Saturday and turn around and say the track is unusable , so options are can the rest or race on the A/W .

Mills would last 5min in Oz, he'd be punted quick smart, Siamese twin of Saundry, separated at birth.

[Ludwig]

12 hours ago, Freda said:

No, but you could at Timaru!

At least at Timaru there are a selection of fine grandstands for the public, unlike the debacle of Riccarton and Addington which only cater for the nobs .

[Ludwig]

6 hours ago, nomates said:

Do you notice the only person not concerned about that being a reality , for no other reason that they don't understand the implications , is Mills himself .

What are the chances that they run 2/3 races on Saturday and turn around and say the track is unusable , so options are can the rest or race on the A/W .

What has Mills achieved? I keep being told, the Couplands Mile, but that was 15 years ago. What since then?

[nomates]

26 minutes ago, Ludwig said:

What has Mills achieved? I keep being told, the Couplands Mile, but that was 15 years ago. What since then?

But that is NZ racing , we just keep following pretty much the same pattern , when our quality and quantity of horses has fallen away .

Our whole racing pattern needs an complete overhaul along with the ratings system , work with what we have not what we were .

[Reefton]

According to my info the outside of the course proper at Riccarton last Friday was diabolically heavy for horses heading from the birdcage to the crossing onto the AWT.  The outside has always been the best so what hope the  fence given the moisture they have had?  They have got a couple of days of Nor westers on offer though.

Tim doesn't seem too happy about things.

In other news I see that 'Regional Track Advisors' have been appointed and ours is none other than the Riccarton Track Manager Mr Chapman.  Just the sort of person we need with a track record(excuse the pun) like his.

Anyway I hope to hell they run the Winter Cup because I have half a leg of one Pitty fancies a bit.  I'm a bit broke at present and could do with the stake.  if it gets down to eight runners and no northerners it will suit me fine though I suspect that bloke from Wanganui won't be put off by the prospect of a dodgy track

 

[curious]

7 hours ago, Reefton said:

According to my info the outside of the course proper at Riccarton last Friday was diabolically heavy for horses heading from the birdcage to the crossing onto the AWT.  The outside has always been the best so what hope the  fence given the moisture they have had?  They have got a couple of days of Nor westers on offer though.

Apparently, one wag of a jockey suggested that you just about needed to have given one a run to have it fit enough to even get from the birdcage to the crossing.

[Doomed]

9 hours ago, Ludwig said:

What has Mills achieved? I keep being told, the Couplands Mile, but that was 15 years ago. What since then?

Mills didn't achieve the Couplands mile. When Winston first dished out money many years ago and made the 2,000 Guineas $1m they were told they had to move it from the Wednesday to the first Saturday, for some reason. To replace it they moved the Churchill Stakes from the last day and boosted the stake.

The CJC hasn't added a single new race for the last 30 years other than races like the Canterbury Belle, Timaru Stakes and a fillies and mares race they inherited from innovative clubs who fell on hard times, geez even the Marlborough Cup, North Canty Cup and that Nth Canty 3yo race with the regularly changing name.

All they have done is drop time honoured races like the Sth Is Challenge Stakes, that 2yo fillies race, all the jumps races outside National week, and soon to be all the jumps races during National week, as surely this will be the last National Week.

The last new race I can recall at Riccarton was the Galaxy Stks, probably during the late 70s early 80s, and I don't know if that was their idea as I think Wingatui had one as well.

Compare Riccarton with the number of new races added in Sydney over the last 5 years alone.

[Chief Stipe]

4 minutes ago, Doomed said:

Mills didn't achieve the Couplands mile. When Winston first dished out money many years ago and made the 2,000 Guineas $1m they were told they had to move it from the Wednesday to the first Saturday, for some reason. To replace it they moved the Churchill Stakes from the last day and boosted the stake.

The CJC hasn't added a single new race for the last 30 years other than races like the Canterbury Belle, Timaru Stakes and a fillies and mares race they inherited from innovative clubs who fell on hard times, geez even the Marlborough Cup, North Canty Cup and that Nth Canty 3yo race with the regularly changing name.

All they have done is drop time honoured races like the Sth Is Challenge Stakes, that 2yo fillies race, all the jumps races outside National week, and soon to be all the jumps races during National week, as surely this will be the last National Week.

The last new race I can recall at Riccarton was the Galaxy Stks, probably during the late 70s early 80s, and I don't know if that was their idea as I think Wingatui had one as well.

Compare Riccarton with the number of new races added in Sydney over the last 5 years alone.

Tim Mills 27 year legacy.  That's how long he has been CEO.  Can we blame him for the state of the track?

[Doomed]

As I said earlier I really did think they would have been talking to Myers, Nelson & McDougal and others weeks and months ago to see what horses they were aiming at this week. I thought they would have been able to list about 90% of the expected noms a couple of weeks ago. To leave it until the day before noms to ask what's about is simply staggering. And where has NZTR been in all this?

[Doomed]

4 minutes ago, Chief Stipe said:

Tim Mills 27 year legacy.  That's how long he has been CEO.  Can we blame him for the state of the track?

I can just picture Mills heading out towards the old public stand with a box of dynamite, muttering to himself "I'll show the bastards I can do something constructive (destructive)".

[Chief Stipe]

9 minutes ago, Doomed said:

As I said earlier I really did think they would have been talking to Myers, Nelson & McDougal and others weeks and months ago to see what horses they were aiming at this week. I thought they would have been able to list about 90% of the expected noms a couple of weeks ago. To leave it until the day before noms to ask what's about is simply staggering. And where has NZTR been in all this?

But they've never got this part of planning right - never.  It's so simple to do as well.  So simple that one must think that they have an agenda to NOT do it.

Why do they need to rely on being contacted when someone could spend a few hours on the phone and call the Trainers?  Isn't that how Club Secretary's used to work in the old days without smart phones and the internet?

[Doomed]

I still struggle with the concept that most of the SI's problems will be resolved when they get rid of Timaru. On that basis we should already be seeing significant progress with Motukarara, Waikouaiti, Marlborough, Hokitika, Winton, Wyndham all gone in recent years, but I haven't really noticed it so far. 

And surely they can't race all of the extinguished clubs meetings on the AWT? The SI will still need some grass track meetings in the summer, and even winter, months. It is hard to see how this Riccarton grass track can provide the quality and consistency required.

[Doomed]

2 minutes ago, Chief Stipe said:

  Isn't that how Club Secretary's used to work in the old days without smart phones and the internet?

Before they had all the enthusiasm and innovation knocked out of them.

[Doomed]

9 hours ago, Reefton said:

According to my info the outside of the course proper at Riccarton last Friday was diabolically heavy for horses heading from the birdcage to the crossing onto the AWT.  The outside has always been the best so what hope the  fence given the moisture they have had?  They have got a couple of days of Nor westers on offer though.

Tim doesn't seem too happy about things.

In other news I see that 'Regional Track Advisors' have been appointed and ours is none other than the Riccarton Track Manager Mr Chapman.  Just the sort of person we need with a track record(excuse the pun) like his.

Anyway I hope to hell they run the Winter Cup because I have half a leg of one Pitty fancies a bit.  I'm a bit broke at present and could do with the stake.  if it gets down to eight runners and no northerners it will suit me fine though I suspect that bloke from Wanganui won't be put off by the prospect of a dodgy track

 

How race fit are the southerners going to be for this sort of track?  Even the CD horses with all their abandonments might get a shock. And with no rain forecast the track could be quite puggy, it doesn't dry out. Margins back to last might be interesting.

[Chief Stipe]

8 minutes ago, Doomed said:

Before they had all the enthusiasm and innovation knocked out of them.

But they were mostly volunteers!!!  Mills and his lot plus NZTR have been on the industry tit for decades!

They only have one job!!!

[Freda]

1 hour ago, Doomed said:

How race fit are the southerners going to be for this sort of track?  Even the CD horses with all their abandonments might get a shock. And with no rain forecast the track could be quite puggy, it doesn't dry out. Margins back to last might be interesting.

That is a huge concern to some - yes, it's very useful to have the polytrack as a work option - otherwise the swimming pool or standing in a box is all one could do with the weather we've had.

But as for conditioning horses for the expected surface, no.

Those with their own transport or plenty of dosh can go to Rangiora, or Ashburton if that's closer - or the beach - but Riccarton based horses are at a big disadvantage otherwise.

 

[nomates]

Taranaki having an inspection at 9am tomorrow morning , with more information to come . I doubt if that information will be that they are xfered to another track , we don't effing have one .

Perhaps the new A/W seeing as how it passed with flying colours today , fields will be reduced to 6 runners tho , good luck to the rest .

After this inspection it will be onto Waverley's Sunday meeting .

Jesus it's a shite fest .

[Huey]

1 hour ago, nomates said:

Taranaki having an inspection at 9am tomorrow morning , with more information to come . I doubt if that information will be that they are xfered to another track , we don't effing have one .

Perhaps the new A/W seeing as how it passed with flying colours today , fields will be reduced to 6 runners tho , good luck to the rest .

After this inspection it will be onto Waverley's Sunday meeting .

Jesus it's a shite fest .

Highly likely to be called off then, $300k in stakes where will they go? Will the brains trust running the industry have the gumption to put on another meeting , add races to another venue ?? The posibilities are endless and only restricted by the intellect of those running the industry - we are screwed!

[nomates]

Taranaki OFF , with nothing about looking at moving it elsewhere tomorrow , just go Feck yourself owners . 

So we are yet to see one meeting saved by the A/W's in any jurisdiction .