CEO Andrew Kelly has been interstate but he got back to me this afternoon and said he will be bringing the thread to the attention of the survey Working Party next week.
CEO Andrew Kelly has been interstate but he got back to me this afternoon and said he will be bringing the thread to the attention of the survey Working Party next week.
Hi Mitch
Your suggestion regarding the consolidation of services is an absolute must.
I am certain the savings will tally well into the millions.
There is an unbelievable amount of wastage in replicating across all states functions such as prizemoney distribution, driver fee distribution, ownership transfers, horse registration ...
I have been pushing this since Australia developed a national database.
This suggestion may just get traction but it needs a lot of pressure from participants as statewide legislation is strangling our wonderful industry.
Mitch while I'll agree with most of your points ,the thought of closing down tracks has been our biggest mistake in Victoria. About ten years ago hrv decided in there great wisdom that the punting dollar was the be all of everything and as long as people were betting on there phone accounts there would be always plenty of money but what they forgot was patrons generally end up owner who bring there friends and so on . Traralgon is the classic example ,that area now has over 200000 people ,no trainers left,galloping track( we're the old 800 track was) have picnic meetings every couple of months and average 5-10,000 people. if you think hrv were interested in patrons why would they build a track with a parade ring behind a stable complex,no roof over a grand stand,and function rooms that don't even face the track ,shit weren't they keen on getting people to the track. The cost of lack of participation in small country towns far outweighs the small costs of maintaining a few tracks each year. The little brown jug is on the worst track I've seen,run down facility's ,but is the best day I've spent on a race track maybe they should close it down.
I don't mean get rid of all TAB meetings throughout the day however like the thoroughbreds have Wednesday as their mid week metro meetings and Saturday is their main metro meet every week without fail, harness racing should have Tuesday or Wednesday night as the main mid week meeting in each state and Friday or Saturday night at the main metro meeting in each state every week without fail. These meetings should all be night meetings in my opinion.Quote:
Originally Posted by Messenger
All states must work together and negotiate hard with Tabcorp to get 30mins between races where possible and explore the commercials on some dedicated Sky 2 action.
We need to be smart about which tracks we close but unfortunately we simply can't afford to keep them all. I take your point about the Little Brown Jug but that's an exception not the rule. If we have a manageable track landscape across each state all with an appropriate standard of facilities and track quality, you can then tailor marketing and attraction strategies based on the local demography & target audience to maximise on course attendance.Quote:
Originally Posted by cyclone george
We need to maintain a good balance of 800m, 1000m & >1000m tracks but we cannot keep them all.
I cannot imagine which tracks you would close down my way Mitch - you obviously are not a believer in the strong case mounted on this thread that closing tracks loses us participants and snowballs on. The only thing I would say is that with 100 days between meetings sometimes (I do not know why this is the case at Stawell at the moment) the tracks are definitely underutilized for racing at times. Hamilton and Horsham are very good tracks now, Ararat has lights for night racing as does Terang. Charlton is strong and popular ......
I notice you are from Sydney and although originally a city boy too I notice that things are different in the country. I visit country towns in the region just because I have never been there and want to put a picture to the name. Most of these towns are a shadow of their former selves but you might find they still have a Showgrounds of all things eg Coleraine that I visited yesterday. Infrastructure like tracks and showgrounds would seem to be maintained on a shoe string and are part of the fibre of the town. There is no other purpose for the land they are occupying - generally there is an abundance of land in country towns. If we lose the town as well as the track we are in danger of becoming a Melton and Menangle code one day instead of a national code.
Hi Kevin,Quote:
Originally Posted by Messenger
The statement 'closing tracks loses us participants' is a generalisation. I am not for a minute suggesting a mass closure of tracks. I would encourage a robust review and analysis, by state, to ensure SMART decisions are made. I don't want to bore you with a long winded detailed explanation of how this can be done but it most certainly can be and to the benefit of the industry.
Sensible consolidation is a fact of life in many industries these days, harness racing is not exempt. Re-building this sport is probably more about making unpopular decisions than it is popular ones.
Mitch.
G'day Mitch,Quote:
Originally Posted by Mitch
always like to see your thoughts expressed on the forum, you are a thinker and like the rest of us passionate about the game, I agree with some of the points you have made on this thread, but I don't think you can accurately say 'closing tracks loses us participants' is a generalisation. It is a fact some of our older posters have witnessed this very same thing a few years ago, some "SMART" people conducted "a robust review and analysis " carried out a "Sensible consolidation" removed the racing licences from many tracks and told us "we simply can't afford to keep them all".
Please forgive me mate if you get the impression I'm a bit cynical, but we have been down this road before and it had devastating impacts on participation levels in the sport/industry, to the point that we now struggle to fill fields everywhere and our market share in the racing gambling dollar is shrinking well below the other two codes.
We were once a true competitor for the thoroughbreds and now even the dishlickers are going stonger than us.
Make some enquiries about how you get a dog trainers licence Mitch, the process is nowhere near as convoluted as getting a harness trainers licence, which reminds me that is another idiotic debacle that needs to go, while you are at it ask anyone who has had to go through the "tech course" to get the harness licence and they will tell you they had to endure being "educated" by people that have never had a harness horse in their care in their lives!!! Talk about make it difficult for people to enter the game! and all for absoluteley NO GAIN! That shambles is all in the name of making the game more "professional".
We all want the game to prosper Mitch and we will all have differing ideas about the ways in which to do that.
New ideas that make us more relevant with a changing market place together with the knowledge that time and experience has given us will hopefully combine to save our struggling game, but lets not make the same mistakes all over again, the sport/industry needs more participants not less and anything that hinders new participants entering our game or pushes existing people away should be given the punt.
Cheers,
Dan
These are the things I would change if given the chance.
I would bring in drivers colours why? Because someone has to be the stars of the sport. You Need to able to promote the sport and give people and fans somone to follow. Its works fantasticly well in usa and other parts oversee, where drivers have fan days , sign auotgraphs talk to fans and have a human connection. Drivers need their own colours so they can have their own brand and get sponsorship. Its like any afl or nrl team with a star player, people know their buy their colours, and if their were to change colours every week their brand and sponsors would mean nothing.
I would ban stand start racing. I know its part of tradition in harness racing but its messy and to me makes the sport look unprofessional. There is no right way for standing starts, their tryed many ways and none work.They all most always run late causing prombles for all the other races program. All most always a horse will gallop and ruined its chane in the first 20 meters. And a lot of the time they cause interference to other runers also ruining their chances. Thats why I wont bet on them.
I would make all horses start on the front row like menangle. Because the tracks are so narrow down here in victoria we can properly only get 8 across instead of 10.
Where would I want this? Because every horse get its chane to go forward, there very little interference. And if a horse is gallop they just go without it. Instead of a driver deliberately crashing into a horse on the second row to cause a false start. And again stoping the race from runing late.
I would have all races with only a 20min apart, so the enterainment keeps going and the night is not stop start. The reality is a lot of punters as soon as they win look to put it staight on the next race. Im sure this is one reason the greyhounds have had a massive increase in market share because of the 20min gap. This also means you can shorten the night by a good couple of hours. I would also only have one meeting a day or night with a 12 race program. So all the best trainers and drivers can attend. Shorely this would help with turn over. Also it would stop drivers, driveing at dangerous high speeds trying to get to 2 meetings in a day. I'm amazed there hasn't been any bad accident.
The praticpants(Trainers,Drivers,Owners) should be able to vote who is the ceo and board. They should be only given a 4 year term. Then be put up again. If their doing a good job they get voted back in, if not have another 3 people to choose from. As it stand now practicpants have NO say in how the industry is run. Been from victoria, I think we need an immedaite clean out of ceo , board ,steweards and start again. Their had 10 years and to say the results have been disapointing is an understatement.
I would get the tab to fix their app and website its so slow. Surely the industry is losing millions of dollars a year because of this. As the tab is the only source of income for the sport. today if punters don't get what they want staight away they simple bet with another site that gives very little back to the industry.
Their needs to be massive amounts spend on marketing. Outside of the industry no one knows it existes. You could walk down the main stree of melbourne or sydney all day asking everyone what harness racing is, and whats the name of a trainer or driver and I would been stunned if anyone could answer you. Thats not good enougn its a great sport and everyone should know about it.
Jack the punter. - great post could not have said it better. When they tried to bring drivers colors in a few years ago the trainers cracked the shits and hrv backed down,but now they have all these promo colors for different causes and haven't heard a ripple of discontent, won't effect trainers who drive there own. Owners who have there own colors shouldn't complain if turnover goes up even 1 % they'll end up with more in there pocket. I can't remember the last time a trainer promoted our sport ( lance does his best with some colourful quotes) but who else. Go to nz yearling sales and all the big stables ,studs have Marques promoting there business and encouraging new owners. Driver colors give you a new race to bet on every meeting with a drivers market ,drivers and there colors in the form is so easy to follow. I would say the majority of once a week punters generally just like backing there favorite driver. HRA are the only orgisisation that doesn't believe sex sells ,I am sure of that because with the amount of goog looking female partication in the trots now it should be simple to market. Hrv if you haven't got the guts to do it you shouldn't be there because your not doing the best for the sport.
pfft marketing..easy.. go trots, watch Smoken Up. Awesome!!
Look forward to hearing from you Cyclone about the Country Clubs meeting tomorrow - hopefully you will bring back some positive news for us forum followers on where the sport is going in Vic!
Dan,Quote:
Originally Posted by Danno
I don't think you or Kevin are being cynical at all. You have very sound reasons for your opinion and much more experience than I do. Track closures wouldn't be top of my list and in fact they may not happen but I would like to see a review of track locations, facilities & infrastructure and catchment areas conducted by a select group of people. If this review was able to find a better landscape than the current and that meant some closures, then so be it. I agree that in the past some very poor decisions have been made regarding track closures and we should never make the same mistake twice.
Another point I would like to add that I missed from my original post is better prize money distribution across age groups. Interestingly the 2012/13 season was the lowest for 2yo starters to foals for the last 5 years and the greatest drop in horses earning prize money was in the 5yo age bracket (-12.7%). However we still continue to throw the kitchen sink at juvenile features and I am seeing more and more 4yo+ races get little or no increased support.
Personally I think we over invest in some of our juvenile/futurity races and don't put enough into feature 4yo+ races, particularly for mares. Juvenile feature racing is great to watch and most certainly plays a pivotal role in driving wagering turnover but whether the APG and Breeders Crown are worth $300k or $200k isn't going to materially change who does and doesn't compete in my opinion. Whilst me must maintain a strong juvenile feature race calendar supported with attractive purses, we must also better spread the prize money distribution for 4yos and open age pacers, especially mares!!
Note: I am not a breeder so I have no vested interest in promoting more support for mares. I just think it's the right thing to do.
Mitch.
Toohard with all due respect Smoken up has been a great champion. But if lance and owners had a "horse first mentally" they would have done the right thing by the horse and retired him 6 months ago or more. IMO the horse should have been retired as group one horse in a group one race. Not been pushed around week in week out for the sake of it in free for allers. I mean what more do their want of the horse? His won 3.5 million. Properly the same as 10 million in gallopers.Quote:
Originally Posted by Toohard
And lance knows it. He just doesn't want to stop being in the lime light. Look at the way his driveing him, Tonite a 32.2 first quarter, 30.5 second quarter. He would never even have worked him that slow in track work. And he only fell in . Two years ago he would have beat those horses by 3 or 4 lenghts.
To make exuses his a gelding or he stills wants to do it are a joke. No top sportsmen wants to retire their have to bee told. You only have to look at punch drunk boxers.
When you run within yourself and he has never been a noted sprinter it us hard to put a gap on them in 26.9 final quarter. Didnt just fall in as you say. If he goes his usual quick quarters Chilli Palmer sprints over top of him but as we've seen past few weeks not even Chilli can make ground in 26 quarters (oh but Themightyquinn can). Good driving.Quote:
Originally Posted by jackthepunter
On topic. Good thread, good topic Messenger. I haven't had time to post my thoughts but most of what I would have said has been touched on so I won't bore you with details.
The thread about promoting harness racing. If the last 400m of that race last night wasn't the best promotion for a long time then I'll go he. And note...FREE promotion.Quote:
Originally Posted by jackthepunter
Fell in? He was headed after they turned. Then Chilli Palmer had him in his sights. And he still won. That from a horse that doesn't want to do it?
Don't know why you taking a pot shot at Lance. He drove the horse to win last nights race against the horses that were in last nights race. And he did it perfectly. He won.
He's doing it to keep himself in the limelight? Please...gimme a break. You go out to the trots when he's racing. People turn up to watch him race. Doesn't matter where it is or what type of race it is, they turn up.
Go check out the trots items on social media. See how many people comment about him before and after he races. Every time he bowls around. You don't think that's one of the reasons he might still be racing?
They are a long time retired. Why would you retire him when he's still competitive and providing so much enjoyment to so many people (and free promotion!). Everyone had him written off 6 months ago. Then he broke 1.50 round Menangle again. Not following one....doing it himself out in front. Everyone was wrong. Lance was right. He'll know when it's time for the horse to retire.
Punch drunk boxers get knocked down and don't get up.... Smoken Up does.
Jackthepunter I agree with you 100% about Smoken Up . I and most of the people I know in the industry think it is sad to see him still going around , he is a shadow of his former self. And Lance hits him 50+ times a race with the whip , not a good add for the sport.
I think this would be a great chance for him to retire with a win !
We are bordering on going off topic - I will summarize and say 'having/promoting champions is great for the sport' and can create a following of the horse and the sport. Why promoting drivers could also have benefits but let's not go down the 'sex sells' line that some have suggested for it is simply off - champions should be promoted and of course you are going to use other drivers who are media savvy.
Sorry Kevin maybe off topic too but didn't want start new thread. Tonight Channel 9 news 6-7pm (Vic for sure..dunno bout other states) something good (didn't want say 'positive') about standardbreds. Ex racehorse now police horse story going to be on.
SweetQuote:
Originally Posted by Toohard
The last 400m a great promotion...i agree but problem is, will we see that anywhere in the near future in any Marketing perspective?Quote:
Originally Posted by Toohard
And more importantly will it be outside the realm of people who already know about our great Trigger and who are already fans of him and the sport?
Connecting to people who have never heard of Smoken Up is the important thing and unless i didn't see it, has Trigger been "promoted" outside our inner circle in the last 4-6 weeks???
This is what needs fixing.
The standardbred horse joining the police force is a great promotion for our sport. He was retrained by "Raising The Standards". They retrain ex harness horses for riding and find them new homes. They also have at least one graduate that went on to join riding for the disabled.
Raising The Standards was started by one girl that loved horses and has grown with help from HRV and other sponsors. They have retrained hundreds of horses and found great new homes for them.
They are on facebook and have their own website, all horse people should check it out.
http://www.raisingthestandards.com.au/
https://www.facebook.com/rtstandards
Thanks for the tip Paul (How did you know?) - Bob got good TV time then
Via Ricks links just above.Quote:
Originally Posted by Messenger
Great stuff!
Terrific story.
With hour long news bulletins these days there is no excuse for networks not to be picking up on good news stories in our sport rather than running blurry clips of garbage they have plucked from YouTube.
The two things our board should invest in are: a person who liaises/lobbies these outlets regularly, and keeps feeding them leads/items, and a broadcast quality video camera so that we can film the required footage ourselves at the track and email it straight to the studio with some notes on the event. Then all the network needs to do is a voiceover and put it to air!
Our local TV network sent a cameraman to our Easter Cup - he filmed random crowd and racing shots, and he had a piece of paper with some possible topics for a club spokesperson to comment on to camera, then the station taped the Cup off SKY and put it all together for a 3 minute story the next night.
No need to even send a reporter out into the field. Too easy!
Make better use of footage like this (Jodie Quinlan driving): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22IaHgUjXwQ AND get more footage as well (as an owner currently living in Far North QLD, would love to be able to get in race footage like this). This "Puts you in the seat" and maybe if all drivers were required to wear a helmet cam there would be no place to hid from the stewards, maybe then everyone gets given racing room which should equal less interference which maybe leads to punters getting a better run for their money. If the stewards permit them to be used in a race, I'll send a GoPro or Sony Action cam down to my trainer tomorrow.
As much as I like seeing My colours (currently only as an owner) going around in a race, I much prefer seeing my horse going round in a race. If drivers colours means that we can do this sort of promotion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYuF5DNGglQ (Tim Tetrick), or this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiF4d0SNw30 (Dave Palone) and actually market our people to improve participation rates be that as owners, trainers, drivers, punters, race day visitors then I would accept that for the moment my colours have to hang on my wall.
My daughter works for one of Australia's/the world's biggest PR companies - that is what they do One of her clients is a sporting body bigger than HRA - if we do not have a PR co. then we should.Quote:
Originally Posted by Amlin
I live in a galloper dominated area no harness closest is Redclife or Albion park.When i try to convince mates or even just other punters re the benefits of Harness and how great a sport it is the negatives are thrown at me.No one knows the names of our good horses except Blackie up here as was a local idol.I have mentioned Smoken up many times as a champ but been shot down by the fact he won an inter dom but then returned a positive, and had race taken off but trainer was suspended and just kept appealing a bad look.
in this thread closing tracks has been put up as an option up here no tracks left to close .Hopefully in future Gold coast will start again but really no money in racing Qld.
In his recent Horsham Harness Racing History, the ever astute John Peck wrote:
' The show races are long gone due to the wall to wall racing, OHand S concerns, disinterest from a succession of State controlling bodies and poor stakemoney. You cannot help but feel that with their demise so went some of the sport's soul and opportunities to recruit new young fans who were enthralled by the Show trotting action.'
John Peck, Horsham Harness Racing History
Indeed Kevin, indeed.
The show races were a major marketing tool for harness racing, they were a real attraction to people from all walks of life and an appetiser for many an aspiring participant, an ideal grounding for green horses ( and some green drivers) and they were a lot of bloody good fun too!
After Lance's criticism of the 'powers to be' failure to promote the sport - he might like to point them to The Age today.
As we all know the sports news starts with the biggest stories on the back page, well today the gallopers get half the second back page about a race that is still about 3 weeks away (and its not the Melbourne Cup)
Gosh we need some movers and shakers
Flicked through The Sun when picking up a coffee and noticed they had pages of gallops feature stories. I know it is Spring Carnival time but there is a bit of a shortage of sport stories at this time of year and WE just have to get in on the act!
Totally agree Kev and they can start with Harness Racing Weekly/National Trotguide, I know that I've whinged about this before but last weeks edition hit an all time low, Less than 5 minutes reading and it was done. For christ's sake, Get some bloody feature story's going.
Warning : Kevin the nitpicker now
No wonder we cannot get any media coverage if this is an example of our HRV media
http://www.harness.org.au/news-artic...?news_id=24577
The second sentence states
With first-class racing on the track, punters will be well catered for with full TAB facilities.
Who could have imagined that Tabcorp Park would have full TAB facilities!
Today, The Age has 12½ pages of form guide in for the gallops (mostly colour and mostly for tomorrow) and a page with 3 feature stories.
I know newspapers are dieing but sheez I am envious
Do they still print the age Kevin. You sure it not an old copy
An integral part of breakfast everyday Greg and a little tip for you - I reckon Sunline might be a good thing in the Turnbull
Yer not bad Kevin , but you are correct it all right having social media but you still need something to direct them there. I have know doubt if hrv bought a page of the sun every week for good positive stories and the odd bad one,more people would be more informed. I've been in a million smoke rooms over the journey I'll assure you the back half of the daily gets read before the front half.
We have to make the evening betting period OURS. There is a bigger market after work hours than during the day. At least for Tuesday to Saturday we should have a night meeting ever day for Vic and NSW.
Thursday night dogs is the equal of Saturday gallops for the betting agencies. The gallops are waking up - next year there will be a night meeting every week in Vic and who knows how many eventually
Harness looks great under lights but let's get some better camera work - split screen (better cameras?) Only recently having I got Sky again on the TV, I had forgotten that it is really only computer-small screen quality as you can not even make out the numbers most of the time
Then we will have to make sure these Friday and Saturday night meetings have the facilities to make it a entertainment/dining package for those on-course
These meetings will have to be promoted big time in the media
Harness has to make things happen