Yarra Valley Cup on Oaks Day - A good idea or not?

For the second time YV are holding their Cup on the coat-tails of the gallops Oaks Day meet this Thursday
From memory the turnover pools for the trots races was pathetic last year

People are principally there as an alternative to going to Flemington (just like they are for the Cup day meet on Tuesday)

Would it make any difference if the races were all simply $3500 races?

OR

Is it a good chance to try and convert a few people by letting them see really good harness horses?

Opinions?

I hope someone is going and can tell us if they get the crowd interested in the YV Cup field

As for their other meet this week
LOL I just counted that there 40 gallops meetings around Australia on Tuesday - that is a lot of competition
BUT many of those are NON TAB while YV is TAB (the only non gallops TAB meeting in the whole of Australia during the day)
and YV on Cup day is a tradition for many

Thanks for prompting the discussion. I just had a quick look at Yarra Valley Cup on Oaks Day. The turnover last year was far from pathetic - it was in fact 100% better than the previous year, and appears to have been in the top 10 (or close to it) for all Vic Country Cups. Just taking wagering into account, it would appear the clubs decision to run on Oaks Day was a good one.


In terms of programming, the Racing office aimed to run different programs at Yarra Valley on the Tuesday and Thursday to suit different horses. I am told that the Tuesday Cup Day meeting has traditionally drawn thousands of people - many non-traditional trots people, which is great. I'll be out there tomorrow with my family. Hopefully I'll see a few others on this forum.

I hope I am wrong David. I thought I looked at the pools on the day and thought they were small but I could be mixing them up with the pools on Melbourne Cup day. I cannot bring up Nov 1 and Nov 3, 2016 as the TAB will only show a year's worth of results

I haven't looked at the Melbourne Cup day Yarra Valley numbers, but they might have been lower in 2016 due to only 7 races (8 this year) - also plenty of competition on that day! If so, it would be an example of where an event is put on for promotion of the sport/community benefit, with wagering a lower order priority. Similar approach to Cobram which is run as (our only) non-Tab meeting on the same day. The numbers are important, but it's not all about the numbers!


Also, just looking at the TAB pools doesn't give as accurate assessment as it used to, because of the increased wagering from corporate bookmakers. I have seen outcomes whereby a year on year comparison has indicated a decline in wagering (when only taking the Tab pool and fixed odds into account), but when combined with the corporates and interstate TABs, the year on year comparison was actually a decent increase.

Last year David Aiken supplied HectorJayJay, this year LennyTheShark plus 2 others (maybe he remembered what happened last year Brenno :))

http://www.harness.org.au/racing/fie...&fromstate=vic

http://www.harness.org.au/media-room...?news_id=35323

Lenny broke the Tk Rec in a trial at Shep last week

http://www.harnesslink.com/Australia/Lenny-heads-bush

Devastating to the club that their biggest day - Cup Day has already been abandoned

A tad damp under foot. Moderate flooding on the Yarra and more coming.

Remembering my old home town, I would say the myriad of marquees (a bit of JB alliteration for you :eek:) are already up, let's hope Oaks day and the Trotting Cup can go ahead