We're Doomed

Certainly a few ballots scratched, and more to come at Riccarton tomorrow. Interesting that horses that have already had a start since the resumption get in ahead of others at Wanganui and Auckland, but at Riccarton there are a few form maidens on the ballot.

Yes, true Nomates. I do find it very frustrating. And not really a difficult or costly subject. I wish they would look at how Sydney and Melbourne programme races sometimes. Perhaps our leaders need to start attending some overseas conferences to get a few ideas.

Programmes out now for August and Sept and stakes expected to be similar to last year. Bit of a worry that a lot of SI meetings have only 7 races programmed. There are going to be a lot of horses eliminated. Personally I would rather have seen 65s running for $20,000 and open horses for $32,000 and use the extra money to programme some decent 10 race cards, and perhaps a few extra meetings.

Riverton should not be racing on New Years Day. That meeting should be at Timaru. Timaru should have their Cup with decent supporting stakes, so the Boxing Day horses from Wingatui have a sensible progression of races. As it is there is no feature meeting in the greater Canterbury area for over two months in the middle of summer. That is just too stupid for words by anyone's standards. Just another example of NZTR not having any idea how SI racing should work, and no one in the South standing up for the place.

Just too stupid for words really. As I may have mentioned previously SI racing is run by fools, and by people who have never set foot on some of the tracks.

Certainly an interesting concept. Keep those ideas coming.

We do occasionally have thread drifts on here Soliloquy; this one is no worse than many. What Nomates, and Uneasy before him, were referring to was an inflexibility with programmes; something I have often been critical of as well. It is a subject that doesn't interest a lot of people, but it is one that often indicates the lack of imagination in the industry.

Perhaps take on the Auckland trotting club as a consultant, they have quite a bit of useful experience in that field.

At a time when the powers that be are trying to close down all of the small innovative clubs and pour all of the resources into a chosen few, the lack of leadership and imagination shown by the chosen few is very disappointing; but sadly not at all surprising. You do wonder after all the effort that has been put into eliminating so many smaller clubs whether rita and NZTR have given the bigger clubs the message that they really have to lift their game and they can't expect to just have everything handed to them on a plate. Can anyone name the last innovative race the CJC has initiated? What is Canterbury's equivalent of the Everest? As far as I can recall, the last four or five feature races the CJC has added to their schedule have all been inherited from other clubs.

Surely they will split at least one race. It really is time the trainers stood up for themselves, no one else seems capable of doing anything. There is absolutely no imagination or leadership in SI racing. There is so much potential for racing in the South, but it is so poorly run.

Only one race has fewer noms than the maximum field size, 14 when the limit is 16. One has 29 noms, which I imagine they will split. So I can't see any reason to leave noms open.

Those smaller clubs used to waste far too much money encouraging owners and trainers. Much better their courses get sold up and the money given to the metropolitan clubs who know how to run a slick operation without encouraging excess drinking and fraternizing.

That Auckland starter who made the cock up did experience fairly severe repercussions. Not sure whether Fiend was just a spelling mistake or you really do know a demon.

Both of the systems you refer to have been used in the past. IE Class 1 being open class and class 5 one win, and at another time the class actually relating to the number of wins; class 1 = 1 win etc. There was even a class 6, being for up to 6 wins, before moving onto open class, at a time when horse numbers were plentiful. The ability to drop back is good in theory as it allows horses that might otherwise have reached their mark to remain competitive; it just needs to be applied properly. It seems strange to me that when they dumped four grades (70, 75, 80, 85) and replaced them with just 72 and 82 that they didn't drop 65 back to 62 at the same time. Currently it is pretty hard for a 58 horse to get a start with that grade cluttered up with drop back horses.

It was a strange pattern, some horses just didn't seem to handle it. River Jewel was another that had a perfect run and didn't kick on at all. And yet 2 or 3 hot favs won effortlessly.