Rusty

So owners and trainers moan about stakes levels yet  are not prepared to run when the money is put up. 8-9 k races at Mot attract 213 noms. NZMTC have 10 k minimums and top race worth 20 K yet they only get 127 noms.
To me that just smacks of amateur behaviour or plain stupidity IMHO.
 
Greg

Well done.....thinking back 50 years did your club do anything to future proof the sport/industry ?
Looking around the country I can't see too many that did....some did and failed e.g. Avondale RC who tried night racing and ATC who went for Apartment building.Addington developed into a great facility then got Earthquakes .
Ellerslie is a fantastic facility , yes it stages the biggest races on the best dates ,but they have investments of $40mil and equity of $140mil .........oddly still holds some $10 races at times and the track was definitely substandard for years.
Sure there are some great country clubs.......over Christmas I saw article on Central Otago / Omakau track still run brilliantly by locals....volunteers.
But there has been a lost generation in NZ racing.......too much else to do and drop off of volunteers.
Several areas e.g. Wingatui was once a huge training centre...Taranaki too.
But overall money was never ploughed back into infrastructure .....tracks and facilities. 
It was ploughed into running our impressive TAB and Trackside TV coverage.......now TAB salaries and admin costs continue to close in on what is paid to the clubs for stakes and facilities upkeep.
Interesting Avondale which has good level of equity is a good example of 'what the hell happened'. Good track but possibly worst grandstand structure in world and has lost all Saturday dates even for iconic races . Doesn't appear to work in with neighbours and even Members have court cases v Club ! I heard a submission pleads we go back to the $1 each way punter who walks round with Best Bets in pocket .....Avondale makes $900,000 pa from non racing activities !
I too did some work with clubs 40 years ago when volunteers ran the place .....#1 trainer in area was track manager etc .
Sadly the world has moved on....Us racing types haven't....
Love of Lotto easier than racing , less time to waste , and we always blame the other guys ! Tastes got more sophisticated.
Meanwhile the suits came in and paid massive salaries and H & S took over ...........
Phew...what a rave.
I see the Horse doping case from USA has made the sports news.......everyone is out to get us in NZ!
At least us tragics can still race horses  and bet in Australia and Singapore etc where costs/rewards are more equitable !
 

It says a lot for her tenacity and overall character/spirit to come back from that horrendous fall and horrendous spinal injuries. Not many do with spinal injuries like she had. Champion effort from her and I wish her best with her life whatever that holds. I also hope she decides not to race ride again (as that must be a temptation for one with such a strong and competitive nature as Maija) as the exponential risks to her future, associated with a secondary fall, don't bear thinking about. All the best Maija. I am hoping we may see this amazing young lady training horses one day as Mum and Dad are dab hands at it.

No I think he has personal issues ...lets let him have the time to sort those out rather than speculating...I wish him well and hope he gets back riding shortly.

He does seem to be Goooooone! (in a Bill Lawry voice) after the first leg on a very regular basis... 

Great to see a trotter get up to run a place last night at Alex park... It's name?
Recycle.
11/12 in the betting. Paid $7.70 the place. This suggests a few things to me... obviously there weren't too many tree hugging hippies on track last night. And secondly punters that were ontrack or tuned in, automatically dismissed the horse, based purely on it's name. To be fair, my eyes completely glazed over it... it was my dear wife that laughed, I mean pointed out it's name to me. 
The best part? The trainer/owner is Mr Green. Kid you not. 
I vote this horse gets automatic entry to the climate change race meeting. 
Never mind votes for the All Star mile. We need votes for the climate change race meeting. We all need to "raise awareness" for climate change. And HOW DARE YOU if you don't. 
We owe it to the world, to our children and our children's children. 
First vote: the 4yr old trotter; Recycle. 

Great to see a trotter get up to run a place last night at Alex park... It's name?
Recycle.
11/12 in the betting. Paid $7.70 the place. This suggests a few things to me... obviously there weren't too many tree hugging hippies on track last night. And secondly punters that were ontrack or tuned in, automatically dismissed the horse, based purely on it's name. To be fair, my eyes completely glazed over it... it was my dear wife that laughed, I mean pointed out it's name to me. 
The best part? The trainer/owner is Mr Green. Kid you not. 
I vote this horse gets automatic entry to the climate change race meeting. 
Never mind votes for the All Star mile. We need votes for the climate change race meeting. We all need to "raise awareness" for climate change. And HOW DARE YOU if you don't. 
We owe it to the world, to our children and our children's children. 
First vote: the 4yr old trotter; Recycle. 

I thought it was decent commentary , iam not big fan of his commentary at times when he goes a bit OTT over some bog standard race  but he is good  , I am confused as to why he didn't bust out WAAAAAAAAAAAAY 2 GOOD ,as  that was a shut the gate brained them job . What a fantastic horse , 5k price well done the buyer . It's not the horses the issue with racing at the moment . So many good ones about . Cannot wait to see Levante go again .

The only stoke happening is between yourself and your right hand 

But is it any real loss to not see or have to listen to Paul Davies prattling on and to a lesser extent Lagan, PGG only used stock agents a lot of the times so im going in to bat for NZB auctioneers, the buyers already know the breeding  and what the want to bid on
 
Greg

Apparently he was "filling in" which wasnt announced when he was appointed. He did a very good job however.
I think guys like him, Teaz, and Evans get a pretty rough deal. Teaz is outstanding and I prefer him over anyone in NZ. Knows his stuff, knows the real industry participants, and calls a great race. We need to look after guys like him. Evans will be the next caller for the CD if those "in the know" actually know anything at all. There's a few callers who get the royal treatment and some have been red carpeted to their prominent roles - God knows how. We should also spare a thought for a guy like Tom Wood who could have given up completely after the way he was treated. He's having the last laugh now though.

but best not speculate.let the processes take their course.all involved need to be seen to be fairly treated.the costs are a real nightmare for everybody .win lose or draw.

Gee that Tui Cooper talks a lot of shit

Isn't it great to see so many people posting in this thread. Just goes to show how valued and important the climate change situation is to racegoers, I am sure Greta will be absolutely delighted. 
Now, I have had another idea with regard to this climate change race meeting.
Stake money... we don't need it. Let's do away with all stake money for this meeting, and instead, winning and placed horses can be given some carbon credits. I'm sure that will go down well and really get the number of horses up at the meeting. 

Spot on.
The rivers of waste - plastic and other -  pouring into the sea concern me much, much more.    As long as there has been a planet Earth with a climate,  there has been climate change.  If it hadn't been for an event of catastrophic proportions that knocked off the dinosaurs, we [as a species ] wouldn't even be here.  
But the way we are going,  it seems unlikely that we will knock them off their perch as one of the most successfully adapted animals ever....

My worry is that as ever we desire to lead the world and could drive ourselves to poverty when in reality anyone who's travelled knows  90 per cent of world's pop don't know where we are , who we are , what we do let alone what we doing to "save the world" with our minute population number, and if they do know all above trust me they couldn't give a fxxk what we do here .

I have just finished putting in a submission to the racing bill as regards the formula for distribution of funds.  Not hard to do,  just go to parliament. Nz and it’s easy to find.     I would have to say it’s a pity HRNZ has not been proactive in encouraging people to put in submissions because if the recommended formula for distribution of funds is adopted race stakes for harness will decrease significantly.    HRNZ should have put out a guide weeks ago on how to make a submission & published template submissions to help people make a good case for retaining the current formula.         Good on Mick G for bringing this up on the Box Seat.   

You could hand out a free copy of the book "Climate Change Delusion and the great electricity rip-off" by Professor Ian Plimer to everyone who comes through the gate.  Perhaps then people might start to realise what a giant con this whole climate change religion is.  The masses have been brainwashed, particularly in NZ where the left leaning media publish nothing that questions the whole hoax.  Also you will probably find that most racing people are not the remotest bit interested in climate change, they are too busy trying to eke out a living.
 
As for donating to the Australian bushfires, these have been largely the result of incompetence at state and local government level, not allowing land clearing or preventive burns to reduce fuel loads in forests.  Over 200 people have been charged with arson, most of the fires having been deliberately lit. Yes there has been a drought, but this has nothing to do with climate change.  There is no link between drought and climate change.  If it was getting warmer then you would have higher evaporation from the ocean, leading to MORE rainfall.  In fact it is the Indian Ocean dipole which governs much of Australia's rainfall.  The dipole has moved in recent weeks, bringing on the monsoon in the north.  The east coast of Australia is in for record rainfall over the next 8 days  and you will likely see widespread flooding.  Here in Central Victoria we have already had nearly a third of the total rainfall we had for all of 2019. Of course you won't read about any of that in the NZ newspapers or on tv.
Sooner or later the NZ population will wake up from their slumber.  In the meantime you need to do something about increasing stakes or you will see more trainers and jockeys making the move to Oz.

This is exactly what I'm talking about... the white non-biodegradable, non-recycleable plastic hamburger container, with a few discarded plastic single serve sauce thingys on the side... 
Whichever club runs this climate change race day, please take Addington raceway's example on this. 
P.S caged (non-free range) egg, for an extra dollar. Can't beat it. 

Rusty if ever there's a war against a battalion of fit trained  vegans can you post me to a mortar platoon and I can fire a few of these delights at the advancing attackers . Those tomato sauce packets are deadly too  , even a trained rifleman can inflict  themselves some friendly fire squeezing those babies out .
 
 

This is exactly what I'm talking about... the white non-biodegradable, non-recycleable plastic hamburger container, with a few discarded plastic single serve sauce thingys on the side... 
Whichever club runs this climate change race day, please take Addington raceway's example on this. 
P.S caged (non-free range) egg, for an extra dollar. Can't beat it. 

Wherever the venue may be for this climate change race day, it is vitally important that the meeting is held on a Friday afternoon, kicking off at about lunchtime. Guaranteed to get the school aged kids there then. Take advantage of this, and run a kiddys tote for the feisty wee buggers. 
I wouldn't bother advertising or promoting horse races at the venue for the day either. Just invite the tree huggers to have their gathering at the racecourse. Then conduct the meeting as per normal. Guaranteed to get oncourse numbers up, and raise the awareness of horse racing. 
Could even fire up the rent a crowd even more....
Get the oldest, dirtiest, gas guzzling tractor that pisses out black smoke to move the starting gates, and leave it running throughout the day. 
Dish out as many plastic straws as possible. Even if people don't buy a drink, give them a free straw. 
Make sure all food is wrapped in plastic. Even hot chips. Throw plenty of glad wrap over the pottle. 
Get a sh!t load of those small single serve tomato sauce packets. Plastic of course. Make them free. Just like they do at Addington raceway. 
Serve all food in those white non-biodegradable plastic holders, you know the ones, with the lid. Think old school hamburgers from the 80's. 
Track manager should cut down some trees on course with a couple of Stihl chainsaws between races. The wood can then be used as fuel for the fires that can be lit in the old metal 44 gallon drums, to keep the racegoers warm. 
Just a few thoughts there, off the top of my head. 

Wherever the venue may be for this climate change race day, it is vitally important that the meeting is held on a Friday afternoon, kicking off at about lunchtime. Guaranteed to get the school aged kids there then. Take advantage of this, and run a kiddys tote for the feisty wee buggers. 
I wouldn't bother advertising or promoting horse races at the venue for the day either. Just invite the tree huggers to have their gathering at the racecourse. Then conduct the meeting as per normal. Guaranteed to get oncourse numbers up, and raise the awareness of horse racing. 
Could even fire up the rent a crowd even more....
Get the oldest, dirtiest, gas guzzling tractor that pisses out black smoke to move the starting gates, and leave it running throughout the day. 
Dish out as many plastic straws as possible. Even if people don't buy a drink, give them a free straw. 
Make sure all food is wrapped in plastic. Even hot chips. Throw plenty of glad wrap over the pottle. 
Get a sh!t load of those small single serve tomato sauce packets. Plastic of course. Make them free. Just like they do at Addington raceway. 
Serve all food in those white non-biodegradable plastic holders, you know the ones, with the lid. Think old school hamburgers from the 80's. 
Track manager should cut down some trees on course with a couple of Stihl chainsaws between races. The wood can then be used as fuel for the fires that can be lit in the old metal 44 gallon drums, to keep the racegoers warm. 
Just a few thoughts there, off the top of my head. 

Look, I know this in the gallops thread... but surely to goodness it should have been posted in the harness racing section?! 
Let's invite the Amish along!! 
Afterall, they have had some influence into the NZ standardbred breeding in recent years. 

The Kaikoura Trotting Club is going to have to hold this event at their South Bay racecourse. Only because this racetrack has the ocean right behind the back straight and all attendees for the day need to sail to the races, no trucks, cars etc allowed. 
Standing starts only, no mobile starts obviously as this isn't environmentally friendly. 
All racegoers on the day get to take home with them a pile of horse poo, to put on their organic gardens when they get home (2-3 days later, depending on sea conditions). It goes without saying, no plastic bags will be given out to get said horse poo home. 
Definitely has merit this idea. I can see it getting off the ground.