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Peter, inspired by events elsewhere I have some suggestions for the final (round robin) round of this comp: - you should make the second joker (for those who still have one to play) worth triple or quadruple points in the last round - apparently adds a bit of excitement to the comp. I'm sure your Ferdies would welcome this move. There maybe a few whingers opposed to this but its your comp so you should be able to do what you like, and the ungrateful sods should be thankful that you run this at all. - Ian appears to have entered some frivolous banter on this thread which makes it harder to see peoples' picks. Ian's team should be docked points for this indiscretion. (note, this post is not frivolous banter - this is simply feedback aimed at further improving the comp) - the Chiefs should also be docked 100 points as Catalano consistently posts his picks in the wrong format - his picks are often not in numerical order (dock Memphis while you're at it) and he posts a lot of superfluous information. - and finally I think you should not post results after every race, or even on Saturday night - you should keep us in suspense until Sunday because that also adds to the interest. - oh, and why not just dock the Chiefs some points because you can!

Ok it's important to finish minor "premiers" The Waikato side had a good hit out on the course proper with Stable stars Catalano 7 from 8 and Jack 8 winners last week and #5 on Mag 7 list just shading Casper #1 on Mag 7 list right on their heels VC who is coming into some solid form and Sylvia who will have blinkers added on Saturday and will have to be at her Beaty to beat Chesty completing very solid work TAB bookie MS who was reported saying this could be the worst result in TAB history the Waikato side who were "sensationally" backed at 50-1 when books first opened it is reported a certain (trader) at the TAB could be looking for new employment in the coming weeks TAB heavily in the Canes corner This match could well come down to the VC Nimue match up and we know who has won the last 2 matches a nervous MS reported

Final Round Robin Day Preview Possibly the most exciting day of the comp as Finals destinies are decided. Dreams are shattered (or realized) and all this on Cox Plate day ! The draw has essentially thrown up 3 different groups of matches: Firstly, the Chiefs and Hurricanes do battle to decide the Minor Premiership, the Chiefs going in with a two point advantage and both teams having expended their Jokers. The personal draws would appear to favour the Waikato so they should start as favourites although you do get the feeling that the 'Canes best performance this comp is still yet to come. But is it just down to these two teams for the Minor Premiership ? Actually, no. The 3 teams that trail them - the Ferdies, Kats and Blues - while mainly concerned with securing a Finals berth, actually each have a Joker to play and each play lower-ranked opposition so a 6, 8 or 10 pointer could provide any of this trio with a Minor Premiership triumph should the Chiefs and Hurricanes cancel each other out in a match which might yield only two team points. Secondly, the Barbarians vs Ferdies encounter offers the Babas the opportunity to continue their good form and finish the Round Robin off the bottom, a matter of great pride to them I'm sure. The Sharks and Magpies who lie just above the Babas each have difficult ties although their own task against the 'Naki team isn't going to be easy either. For the Ferdies any single point will be enough to get them into the Championship Finals although it would actually take an amazing set of complicated specific results to all align to deny them a Finals berth. Thirdly comes the fascinating fight for the Final 3 Championship Finals spots. Essentially contested by 7 team for 3 places although as mentioned above the Ferdies only need one point and the Kats just two to be certain of making it and each team has a Joker to play. Both sides could lose and still make it through. The real battle would seem to be for the 5th and final qualification spot. Currently occupied by a nervous Blues franchise with 4 pretenders nipping at their heels. The Turbos and Crusaders, who have each deployed both their Jokers, look the best chance to make it through. The Crusaders in particular can do themselves (and the Turbos) a huge favour as they play The Blues in their final match. But even if the Cantabs beat the Auks they will still need to rack up at least 4 points, if not 5 depending on aggregate outcomes. It's also possible they could beat The Blues but fall short on points needed to claim the Finals berth and leave the door open for the Turbos who just need 4 team points to head the Blues off for the last Finals spot. The Turbos opponents are the Magpies who like the Sharks (one place above them) still have a Joker to deploy. Both sides need a 5 pointer (resulting in 10 team points with the Joker) or at least a 4 pointer in the case of The Sharks who are facing The Kauri Kats. The Turbos and Magpies would be hoping for the Crusaders to engineer a very low scoring (2 point) win over the Blues to pave the way for a sensational late finish with a fistful of points to make their Finals dreams come true. The Sharks in particular seem to have benefited from some favourable personal match-ups against the Puddy Kats. It looks like it's going to be a cracker with many teams having to keep an eye on other matches as well as their own. Good luck everyone.

Thanks for that bloody dropkicks if that is the reason

Was reading the lift out from the Friday Flash on Thursday , one of the esteem analysts had given a prediction on the final round of the round robin ...coming out on top the Chiefs after their 3-2 victory over the Canes with a team profit finishing first on 26 points holding of the fast finishing Ferdies who scored an 8 pointer unfortunately scoring $7 less than the Chiefs on their final round also scoring an 8 pointer and securing a top 3 finish the K Kats (Kit?) powering into 4th place with a 6 pointer the Blues setting up a mouth watering elimination final against the Canes unfortunately the Canes final round score $1319-90c yielded no points ah well there's always next week Wellywood Any who I was speaking to a couple of well known form analysts Kath and Kim and their Uncle Arthur who has his ear close to the ground with the O'Shea stable assures me Hartnells the one BHB who has drawn 6 will lead the Cox and Hartnell who has drawn 7 will follow BHB across a race that seems to lack a lot of pace will see stablemate Hauraki who has drawn 9 come around Hartnell and give Hartnell the one one Hauraki from its draw and the way the race will be run will not be able to do what it did last start Finally would like to thank John for his suggestions and reward him with a winner from Addington Dogs today Race 02 selection 07

The problem that these presenters have is they haven't taken the time to study what is working in other jurisdictions around the World. I don't understand the stupidity or arrogance (or both) that would make them and the producers/ directors decide that they know best as present the garbage that is currently presented. I've just spent 6 weeks in the UK and got involved further in the industry over there. It's bliss in comparison to the dross that we dish up here. We are amateurs. I'll give you one example...the Trackside presenters have obviously been told to push betting so their version of that instruction is become tipsters. That's all well and good if you're good at it, but if you're not you make a complete mockery of the game, the poor viewers and they continuously discredit themselves. By doing so they discredit the opportunity to promote betting by showing that it can't be done successfully. You force feed this rubbish for long enough and the average person who may want to get involved won't. Why isn't this proposition difficult to understand. Its negative marketing. Wake up and promote the owners. Get rid of the useless tipsters, get some in-depth industry participation and cut out the concept that we are a "product". Start promoting the horse and the participants. The betting will cone if you successfully demonstrate the story board. As for Karen Fenton-Ellis' assertion that raising the Herbie Dyke to $400,000 will attract Aussie horses to race at Te Rapa....is she for real. That's a common Group 3 in Aussie under the current conditions......geeeeez......that's as bad as the hype surrounding Xtravigent and our Derby winner's inability to win a group one race in Austraia. As for Europe, no doubt at all that Almanzour is a champion. That means that Iffraaj has sired a stallion capable of producing a World champion. That means that Iffraaj is under at the moment here in NZ. Good on you Mark for getting a good one

What Bazach proposes Midgie has been advocated by many of us for many many years. Look at Trentham. What a joke. There's no horse population, no punters, no race goers. Foxton = excellent natural drainage, easy access, plenty of room. Great horse population within one hour, country people who love racing. Sell Awapuni, Trentham and invest in Foxton with track upgrade ( straight 1200m, etc, new stables and new patrons facilities (eg, Sunshine Coast) with Grandstand on opposite side of the track. Build accom on the track precinct, (tow houses) for participants to rent or buy. It goes on and on. But it will never happen - vested interests, govt that doesn't give a stuff and NZTR who doesn't know what to do, Betting landscape that is 15 years behind where it should be ...

I'll bet Saturday Jason

Hope the "Fat Cats" live up to their names.

No, I've had the odd runner there.

Videos of the breeze ups are on the nzb site now

Tavistock fee set Article courtesy of Dennis Ryan, The Informant Speculation around the 2016 service fee for new boom sire Tavistock has finally ended. In an exclusive announcement to The Informant, Sir Patrick Hogan has revealed that the rising 11-year-old will stand at a fee of $65,000 in his seventh breeding season at Cambridge Stud. “It’s been a very difficult exercise in arriving at a fee that reflects the tremendous success of his first two crops as well as being fair to broodmare owners,” Sir Patrick said. “Mind you, that’s second only to the other side of the equation, sorting through the hundreds of service applications and deciding who’s in and who’s not.” The rise of Tavistock from a stallion commanding a fee of $7,000 just two years ago to now be second only to Waikato Stud’s headline act Savabeel amongst New Zealand stallions has been nothing short of extraordinary. When he retired to Cambridge Stud as a dual Group One winner in 2010, the son of Montjeu covered 127 mares a fee of $12,500. His 2011 book at the same fee numbered 94 and he covered 82 mares in his third season at $10,000. A further reduction to $8,000 attracted 105 mares and he was set to cover a similar number at $7,000 in 2014. That was off the back of his first crop daughter Avisto winning the Listed Great Northern Foal Stakes at Ellerslie as an autumn two-year-old and she took that form into the spring with a stakes win at Wanganui. The turning point for Tavistock, however, was one weekend in September when Avisto completed a black-type hat-trick in the Listed Soliloquy Stakes and in the very next race at Ellerslie Tavistock gelding Volkstok’n’barrell backed up from a maiden win to add the Gr. 3 Bonecrusher Stakes. Throw in a Gloaming Stakes placing by Diamond Valores at Rosehill the same day, and Tavistock was suddenly the bargain of the season. By the completion of breeding activities that December, Tavistock had covered 197 mares and those breeders with mares in foal to him sat back and watched as the feature wins mounted. Volkstok’n’barrell added the Gr. 2 Great Northern Guineas and Listed Karaka Mile before being placed in the Avondale Guineas and New Zealand Derby, then exacting revenge on his arch rival Mongolian Khan in the Gr. 1 Rosehill Guineas. Fellow Tavistock gelding Werther emerged late in the season to win the Gr. 2 Championship Stakes at Ellerslie and in a three-race Australian campaign finished second in the South Australian and Queensland Derby and between the two classics won the Gr. 2 Eagle Farm Cup. A third gelding from Tavistock’s first crop, a leggy bay by the alluring name of Hasselhoof, got tongues wagging with a brace of runaway wins coming through the grades and as a summer four-year-old he won the Gr. 2 Rich Hill Mile in his open company debut. The achievements of Tavistock’s progeny had inevitably prompted a rise in service fee and he covered his largest ever book of 211 mares last spring at a fee of $15,000. The young stallion’s second crop had by then entered the fray, led by Victoria Derby winner Tarzino and added to in the second half of the current season by Tavago, the winner of the Gr. 3 Wellington Stakes late last year before bouncing back to claim the Australian Derby. “It really is a dilemma and I find myself in an impossible position trying to satisfy everyone." By now Australian breeders were convinced that Tavistock was the real deal and if further evidence was needed for an even wider audience, it came when Werther – sold last year to clients of Hong Kong trainer John Moore – won the Hong Kong Derby and then became just the fourth horse to back up successfully in the Queen Elizabeth ll Cup at Sha Tin. That final act was just last Sunday, in the middle of which Sir Patrick Hogan was working through the pile of service applications deciding which mares would be offered their chance at the available nominations. “We had more than 280 applications before last weekend and when Werther won again we had another bunch come in,” Hogan said earlier this week. “The problem is that by the time you add up Cambridge Stud’s service rights, share-holder mares and the pre-emptive right of share-holders to send further mares, there are only 60 to 70 outside nominations. “It really is a dilemma and I find myself in an impossible position trying to satisfy everyone. Those whose applications are successful will no doubt be pleased, but there will be a whole lot of other broodmare owners who will miss out.” The pile of applications included around 50 from Australian breeders and some 45 mares by Zabeel, who features in the pedigrees of more than half of Tavistock’s major winners (see page 27). Having stood champion stallions Sir Tristram and Zabeel in Cambridge Stud’s 40-year history, Hogan is familiar with the brinkmanship required in both selecting a stallion’s final book and setting a service fee. On the latter point, however, the current scenario around Tavistock is unique. “To have left such a list of big winners in such a short time sets Tavistock apart,” says Hogan. “It didn’t happen quite like that with Sir Tristram and Zabeel, it was more gradual, but for a stallion’s fee to make such a dramatic rise in the space of two years is something I’ve never seen before.” In setting Tavistock’s 2016 fee at $65,000, which is exclusive of GST and includes a life foal guarantee, Hogan believes he is being both realistic and fair. “I’m absolutely comfortable in my belief that he belongs at that level,” he said. “The way his progeny are developing and performing there’s clearly another leap to take in the future, but as things stand now I believe we’ve got it right

poker tomorrow so - Kay Hollis (looking for the team to support me AGAIN) 1 - 1, 3 BB (5, 10) 2 - 1, 3 (6, 2) 3 - 4, 9 (1, 6) 4 - 3, 4 (1, 5) 5 - 10, 13 (9, 5) 6 - 2, 5 (12, 11) 7 - 1, 2 BB (7, 5) 8 - 1, 5 (3, 6) 9 - 6, 8 (3, 2) 10 - 2, 3 (5, 1) sylvia 1 - 5, 10 (1, 3) 2 - 3, 5 (4, 2) 3 - 1, 7 (4, 9) 4 - 3, 5 BB (4, 1) 5 - 3, 9 (1, 5) 6 - 1, 4 (5, 2) 7 - 1, 6 (7, 5) 8 - 1, 3 (10, 9) 9 - 3, 8 BB (2, 4) 10 - 1, 2 (3, 10)

Koozer, what about a fella named Andrew John's. A Rugby League immortal, Hall of Famer and arguably the greatest player in recent history. A drug taker, ecstasy throughout his career. A Racist, fired from NSW coaching role for calling Inglis a black c--- A gambling cheat, caused a world of problems for Tom Waterhouse, John Singleton, after passing info onto his very controversial mate Eddie Hayson.

Some would see the Mighty Blues as being nervous about doing well enough tomorrow to secure their spot in the Major Championship Round. From where I'm sitting though it's gonna take a super powerful performance from any of those teams behind us to get up over the top of the Mighty Blues this close to home. But I accept that might just be the jafa in me talking. PJ might have sabotaged our sole home-town Ellerslie race under the spurious reason of needing to accommodate somethiing better , as if there's anything better than the Mighty Auckland, very hard to imagine, but at least he's redeemed himself with a spread of races from that horse-racing paradise the punter-friendly and always predictable Trentham. The Blues Brothers Pete, Gordy, Brian, Geoff and ...and ....ooops..lost one ....that's good captaincy ain't it .....the Blues Brothers are primed ready to run, and one of our number says that taking out the Minor Premiership even from position 5 going in to tomorrow is not beyond the capabilities of the Mighty Blues. Thanks for your confidence Geoff, that's the sort of fighting talk we want to hear. And yes just as an aside the personal matchup between two Broncos superstars Geoff (Mighty Blues) and Rob (Crusaders) will be a classic battle between two competition heavyweights. Good luck everyone tomorrow and to those teams chasing the Mighty Blues yes...please do ...have a go .... if you think you're good enough. hehe

Yeah, will lead anyway, so need some excitment in my life for a short while anyway. Who knows?

You can't even bet into the tote pools, some moron from the TAB has assigned Pukekohe Jetbet 7, the same as Forbury Park tonight, so they can't take any bets on the meeting.......they really are idiots.

That's a yellow card, off the field John. In fact RED card him and make em play with 4.

This should be hi-lighted and rammed down the NZRB throats! A few weeks back I heard B Popplewell give his selections for a suggested quaddie during the week - that will be $500 for 100% ! FFS who in their right mind would spend $500 on his tips? It appears that these trackside tipsters are on an ego trip - they feel on top of the world if they find a winner.

Yes Value Bell she was

Not sure what your point is. I don't personally have any interest in doing media, I happen to be very busy and I'm about to get a whole lot busier, I would however like to see Trackside lift their game, employ some knowledgeable people to work symbiotically with their existing good broadcasters, and improve the industry by making it more attractive. I have no idea what your last comment means but feel free to elaborate.

Crusaders v Blues. R1 4 5 (1) R2 2 5 (1) R3 6 7 (5) R4 5 13 (8) R5 2 9 (4) Best Bet. R6 3 13 (1) R7 1 5 (2) R8 1 3 (5) R9 8 9 (3) R10 3 5 (9) Best Bet. Good luck with your selections Howie.

John Wheeler would be perfect. He seems to be winding down his training career, this'd be an excellent opportunity for him and he'd make far more working for Trackside than he would training horses. It goes without saying that he has the charm, the wit, and the knowledge to be a star.

https://www.racing.com/videos/2016-10-18/harry

Race 1 # 1~ 5 (4,10) Race 2 # 1 ~3 (4,5) Race 3 # 4 ~ 11 (3,13) B/B Race 4 # 4 ~ 11 (8,12) Race 5 # 5 ~ 8 (4,9) Race 6 # 3 ~ 9 (2,8) Race 7 # 2 ~ 3 (5,7) Race 8 # 3 ~ 4 (2,9) Race 9 # 8 ~ 10 (3,6) Race 10 # 2 ~ 6 (1,8) B/B PJ, posting early champ. Shouting the Grand Children to the two days of the Cox Plate Carnival. Preparing myself to be very compassionate on track, helpful with picking winners and encouraging them all to make sure their Grand Pa gets back to his Motel Room ok with all his winnings . Plenty of rain cloud's in the sky's over Moonee Ponds ! Maurice,good luck to you and all our team members ! Ferdies, the very best of good fortune for your upcoming play off competitions. To all my BarBarians teammates, Captain Steve P, Kay, Cubes and Sir Castleton. It has been a pleasure to be in a team with you folks. I trust we can all team up again in a future PJ Tipping Competition. PJ, once again, congratulations, on running a most entertaining and pleasurable Spring Trans -Tasman Super Tipping Competition. Cheers.

Our Resident Star in the North who can talk all day................... POP's Suggested Quaddie + Best Bet of the Day + Multi results recently. I only have the ones I have managed to record but its a sad report card. In 99% of cases ALLBETS bite the dust Matamata 19/10 Loss $112 Ruakaka 12/10 Loss $135 Avondale 05/10 Loss $310 Te Rapa 30/09 Loss $577 Te Aroha ?? Loss $130 Matamata 21/09 Loss $112 Pukekohe 18/09 Loss $314 Taupo 16/09 Loss $185 Te Rapa 14/09 Loss $124 Matamata 07/09 Loss $118 Pukekohe 31/08 Profit $49 Matamata 24/08 Loss $118 Ellerslie 19/08 Loss $204 Avondale 17/08 Loss $200 Taupo ?? Loss $42 Tauranga 03/08 Loss $214 Hastings 21/07 Loss $309 Tauranga 25/06 Loss $210 Avondale 22/06 Loss $195 Son , Has it ever occurred to you that this is not going to be your future ? Good luck with Fridays picks !!

Damn, I went visual and now I need a mind enema

Changes and additions to a comp for fun and variety sake are great, as long as they are fair to everyone and everyone knows about them. Can I make a wee suggestion please that if any additions/changes to the comp over and above those in the original rule thread are made, that updates are noted in the post calling for selections for the next week? Just noting, check new rule, in the thread heading also would be useful, so that folk read the top post and any new rules/additions before putting in their selections. Some cafers don't have the time to come on every day and read through discussion threads for any changes and just shoot in on a Saturday and might read the last couple of posts and then put in their selections - so unless made clear they may miss updates. Thanks

So looks like Ritchie / Mardy Saturday and extra round on cup day is the go. Will finalise details closer to time. Jameka went very well on Saturday could do the cup double