Victorian Owners Association serves it up to Racing Victoria!

[Chief Stipe]

‘Arrogant, terrible': Owners association boss lashes Racing Victoria

Victorian Owners Association boss, Jonathan Munz, has launched a scathing broadside at Racing Victoria.

 

 

By Ben Dorries
06:01pm • 06 August 2023

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Owners association boss Jonathan Munz has launched a scathing tirade at Racing Victoria, adding to the recent wave of criticism levelled at the peak body.

Munz has lambasted RV for a "hotchpotch of poorly conceived ideas and thought bubbles".

The owner of champion sprinter Giga Kick and an influential breeder, Munz claims "arrogant" RV and some of their decisions and ideas are damaging the reputation of racing in the state.

It comes after a week of fierce criticism, following Racenet revealing secret proposals for a whip-free summer series of ‘team racing' where leading participants were briefed but then muzzled with nondisclosure agreements.

Ideas discussed included Big Bash-style innovations, such as jockey earpieces.

"Racing Victoria think they are innovators and marketing and wagering gurus but the reality is that their hotchpotch of poorly conceived ideas and thought bubbles will not get racing any new customers," Munz told Racenet.

"A number of their decisions and proposals have been terrible.

"This has put RV in serious conflict with most of its shareholders and participants and upset racing customers when it should be bringing people together and working collaboratively.

"It was all unnecessary and would not have occurred if RV had properly consulted with and listened to industry participants and experts, instead of arrogantly pushing ahead with and promoting these inappropriate policies."

In a no holds-barred blast, Munz lashed RV on a number of hot topics.

LIVE JOCKEY INSTRUCTIONS

"The RV proposal to use interactive jockey earpieces with live streamed instructions to jockeys from ‘coaches' during races is dangerous and impractical and the associated proposal for an expensive and much criticised ‘teams racing' concept is completely inappropriate," Munz said.

"They are ill-conceived gimmick proposals that will alienate existing racing customers and participants and not encourage any new ones.

Munz added: "Even someone who knows nothing about horses should realise that speaking into a jockey's ear during a race is incredibly dangerous"

"This concept should never have got beyond first base. It is only a few months since we had the tragedy of Dean Holland and before that the terrible incident which left Jamie Kah in hospital for over a month and Craig Williams nursing a broken collar bone," he said.

"Are RV serious about putting jockeys and horses at heightened risk of serious injury, or worse, for some misguided marketing gimmick that no-one wants?

"This is a truly idiotic idea and I cannot see the racing stewards supporting the proposal."

A big crowd at Flemington on Melbourne Cup day last year.

BIG BASH-STYLE TEAM RACING

"The proposal for a summer teams racing series is a poor proposal that has been tried and failed a number of times, both in Australia and in the UK," Munz said.

"With RV claiming to be under budget pressure, this isn't where scarce resources should be spent.

"The fact that the proposal favours certain trainers and owners over others is also inappropriate and there are also integrity concerns around team incentives when a trainer or team has a number of runners in a race."

Jonathan Munz says Big Bash style ideas won't work in racing. Picture: Getty Images.

TOP SECRET

Munz said: "Industry participants are concerned about RV's inability to constructively respond or deal with criticism, highlighted by their attempts to limit and censor opposing views, including the recent bizarre and pointless attempts to impose nondisclosure agreements on its own stakeholders."

"We need leaders who understand the industry and can unite rather than divide people, with a view to delivering long term benefits," he added.

MUNZ'S WAY FORWARD

Munz agrees that racing can't stand still and must attract a new audience to safeguard its future.

However, he insists RV is marching down the wrong path.

"RV justifies its proposals for radical change with a false and exaggerated narrative that such action is required to somehow win over younger customers," Munz said.

"Racing actually does many things well and the large uplift in wagering during Covid lockdowns shows that racing already has a product offering that has strong appeal.

"Young people are in fact clearly engaged during the Melbourne Cup carnival and the challenge has always been to translate that to the rest of the year.

"The correct strategy to maintain and grow interest and engagement in racing is to play to our unique strengths by promoting our equine athletes and their progress and competition in our marquee races and celebrating our leading jockeys and trainers."

Munz added: "A better starting point would be to improve the race day and punting experience. Engage better with race clubs and work more closely with wagering service providers to promote racing and engage better with their millions of existing customers."

"RV has neglected this and refused to do the simple things, like funding sensible and relatively inexpensive initiatives, such as electronic owners ticketing to replace the current system of paper ticketing from the 1950s," he said.

Jonathan Munz is a prominent owner-breeder who owns The Everest winner Giga Kick. Picture: Getty Images.

SPRING PROGRAMMING / PRIZEMONEY

"In relation to the spring carnival program, RV has speculated about moving the Cox Plate and even Melbourne Cup week," Munz said.

"Fortunately, that sort of nonsense was resisted and they instead focused on adding a new race day after the Melbourne Cup carnival.

"They came up with a poorly conceived race day that wrongly moved the Thousand Guineas and Rupert Clarke Stakes, undermined the pattern and wasted money.

"Owners, trainers and breeders all came together to suggest a much better program that provided a real marquee race day, with the same financial investment, but RV insisted on keeping their changes."

Munz added: "In terms of the recently announced reduction in prizemoney to cover a supposed crisis in industry funding, RV undermined industry confidence with negative announcements and then walked it back with an announced cut of less than one per cent.

"For years the industry, with the assistance of former racing minister Martin Pakula and current minister Anthony Carbines, had worked hard to ensure strong revenue streams that made sure our prizemoney was competitive.

"But RV were happy to damage Victoria's reputation and pour a bucket of negativity on the industry, and all for what?"

"This was unnecessary and irresponsible.

"We have maintained that RV needs to be more transparent about and focused on reducing its own overheads and inefficiencies before lecturing us or cutting prizemoney."

[Doomed]

Just imagine if we had an organisation in NZ that came out and told the governing bodies when they had made a massive cock-up.

We might have made a mistake asking Messara for advice rather than Munz. We got the wrong M.

[Huey]

11 hours ago, Doomed said:

Just imagine if we had an organisation in NZ that came out and told the governing bodies when they had made a massive cock-up.

We might have made a mistake asking Messara for advice rather than Munz. We got the wrong M.

The worrying thing here is , if any of these silly ideas see the light of day our silly lot will plagiarise them.