The First Word

3 minute read

The Racing and Sports Magazine provides all your racing information, from week to week, year to year.

The Racing and Sports Magazine provides all your racing information, from week to week, year to year.

The promotion of racing is often a thankless task and one which generates easy criticism.

It is not generally co-related with big race day crowds like it used to be but in the 'good ole days' I'm not sure marketing played much of a role.

So getting interest in racing, especially during non-carnival times is difficult.

Last weekend the VRC had an Asian Young Guns Challenge with young jockeys from around the world riding at Flemington over varying distances.

However there were some outcomes of the promotion which didn't garner great headlines.

Firstly there was not a great deal of added publicity for the challenge.

I don't imagine too many punters were au fait with the credentials of the likes of RT Takakura, RS Shafiq or JP Van der Merw.

The sad thing is many of these kids have serious careers in play in their home countries but for non-hardcore racing purists, they were unknowns to the masses.

Perhaps there was greater need for more education of their records, styles, weights etc before asking punters to load up.

But of more import is the effect of it on betting on a metropolitan Saturday.

You only have to look at the tote markets to see the impact. Using the VIC TAB as an example, and taking into account that the first race was a small field, the average win pool was about $250k.

Now in acknowledging that betting increased as the day goes along, when better quality horses run, the average pool on the other five races was about $400k. That doesn't even look at other pools like quinellas or trifectas or the fixed odds betting.

I'm not being critical so much of the decision to conduct the event. I'm all for introducing new things and mixing it up.

But perhaps it might have been best served being run at a midweek meeting or even a night program at the Valley. That was the view expressed on our facebook page when we posed the question.

The other strange decision was to have one of the races as the first leg of the Quaddie.

Punters found that race hard to work out anyway but when a new ingredient was thrown into the mix, it made life even harder.

Compare this to another riding challenge which ironically was held on exactly the same weekend on the other side of the world.

The Shergar Cup is a contest between some of the world's great riders divided into four teams – Great Britain, Ireland, Europe and the Rest Of The World.

Named after one of the most famous Epsom derby winners, who sadly never got to fulfil his destiny due apparently to being stolen, held hostage and killed, this is run at Ascot now each year.

Australia was represented by Hugh Bowman alongside Douglas Whyte and Yutaka Take and they would win two races but couldn't withstand the late charge of the Irish.

Bowman rode a superbly timed, patient race early on to score over the 1000 dash.

And while some of the biggest jockeys like Frankie Dettori, Keiren Fallon etc were required for black type meetings elsewhere at Newmarket and Haydock Park it still held much interest.

The point being if you are going to have this involvement, you must let the world know about it and bring the locals along for the ride.

Now speaking of racing in England, this week coming we have the Ebor Festival (Ebor is short of Eboracum which is Latin for York).

The Ebor is Europe's richest handicap staying race and one which has produced some Melbourne Cup form in the past.

Purple Moon for Luca Cumani won the Ebor drawing away and of course he would all but win the 2007 Melbourne Cup until Efficient flashed home over the top.

A year later Godolphin's All The Good charged away by over three lengths in a race run at Newbury after rain forced the York festival away from the home track.

Fascinatingly the race itself wasn't even allowed to be called the Ebor (retitled the Newburgh Hcp after the Norman name for Newbury) due to the parochialism of local sentiment.

All The Good would come to Australia and win the Caulfield Cup under Kerrin McEvoy sitting wide the journey.

Others before then to note include Give The Slip (winner in 2000) before going to Godolphin and running an unlucky second to Ethereal up the inside at Flemington. Also Quick Ransom and Hugs Dancer who would come out here after taking the 2002 version to run well in several of Makybe Diva's Cups and also winning a Craiglee over a mile which must have surprised many European race watchers.

One of the potential entrants this year is a horse called Tactician. By Epsom Derby winner Motivator, he is trained by Michael Bell who conditioned the sire as well.

Bell has had other top horses including dual Oaks winner Sariska, the Golden Jubilee Stks with Art Connoisseur and multiple G1 winner Red Evie.

Of as much interest is that Tactician is owned by the Queen who has had a big year in more ways than one.

Now if he runs well at York, he is also a big chance to come for the Melbourne Cup where he has opened up at $151 at the TAB.

The reason he comes into calculations for the trip is that the Queen has a likely engagement in Australia in late October at Perth's staging of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM).

It would not take much to flit over the country a day after the CHOGM summit finishes to be at Flemington would it?

Lastly I wanted to mention that it was revealed this week of some new betting opportunities at the TAB with an expansion of the Fixed Odds medium. You can now take trebles in the TAB outlets or over the phone at this stage as well as the established doubles format.

Often a short favourite doesn't add a great deal to a double but three might generate more opportunity for the big punters to let fly without the result of cannibalising the price on the tote from a large all up on the pari-mutuel tote.

Again I say all wagering agencies need to be re-inventing and cajoling their bettors with new ideas and plans.

We mentioned here before about a possible “Blast In The Last” quaddie incorporating a pool based on the last race in Sydney/Melbourne/Brisbane/Adelaide. It would only cover a 30 minutes window late on a Saturday and might get a big pool.

Another idea could be for the Fixed Odds markets to include place doubles or trebles, not just restricted to win markets.

Gotta keep the punters absorbed and captivated by the possibilities.

At Racing and Sports we have now provided, free of charge, all UK and Irish form and info in our various databases. We think it will make an important addition to the industry.

Check out all the form for those races by going to our RAS FORMGUIDE and then click on the appropriate race meeting. You will notice that we also have videos in place for some jurisdictions and new video comments in our form.

Whatever your involvement there, we have your needs covered.

We welcome all your views so please contact us via our email support@racingandsports.com.au

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Until next week,

Good Luck and Good Punting.

Gary