The ASBP Report: How can they be serious? Bad news for harness owners

[mango]

@aussiebreno you think we dont need to breed more foals. If the numbers keep droping it will no longer be viable for the better quality US stallions to come down under( Aus & NZ ) and that would be a disaster for our breed.
Does anyone know if nz foal numbers are also droping ?
aussiebreno you have said you don't breed or own horses, could you tell us what your involvement in the sport is ? I'm not having a go at you , I just want to better understand your position and views.
Maybe the pannel could have looked into why so many foals don't make it to the track ? It cant just be because they are fillies or not good enough. I have known many people who never try horses, just leave them in the padock, mostly due to training costs ect.

Hi Gutwagon

Mare's served in N.Z over the last 10 yrs have averaged around 4200 with last year being there lowest out of the 10 yrs at 3500.

[eliteblood]

I share similar views Triple v, yet when this was brought up with various state programmers they suggest that on many occasions when they do program fillies/mares only races, they dont receive enough noms. my response was that they should simply program them and race them anyway, and eventually trainers will see them and put their fillies and mares in

Mightymo,

That is the answer you always get, we tried it and the races didn't stand up. I'm sure that is true.
I think that can be overcome if a long term approach is adopted. It is no good leaving individual clubs to program these races in isolation other wise you get the situation where Menangle may program a C0 mares on Tuesday and Penrith program the same on Thursday. Neither race stands up.
IMO, there needs to be certainty so that owners and trainers know with certainty that there will be a C0/C1 mares at Menangle every 2nd Tuesday and a C2/C3 on every other week. On the weeks that Menangle has a C0/C1, Penrith has a C2/C3 and vice versa. These races need to be guaranteed. This is only an example, but the philosophy needs to be developed in each state - more than that, in each region of each state. It needs to be widely publicised so that everyone is aware of it.
Mightymo, as you will have read here, I have doubts about the degree of benefit that the mares breeding credt scheme will deliver and I think the greatest opportunity, at little or no cost, is to fix this situation whereby mares have limited racing careers. Your proposal makes reference to it but I would like to see some more specific recommendations.

[gutwagon]

Thanks for that info mango.
It seems clear that we need to encourage breeders/owners to race and keep racing their fillies/mares. I know that adding more mares races to the program wont fix the problem overnight but we must start increasing them now.
I own a 4yo mare, it was fine as a 2 and 3yo she could just race mostly against fillies, now at 4 she has to race the boys. In Vic mares can race in open sex races and drop 1 class (eg c3 mare can go in c2 mixed sex race) this helps but as you move up classes it gets much harder. What incentive is there for me to keep racing her ?
How about a bonus for a mare if she beats the males, what about discounts for fillies in the vicbred and breeders crown series ? Discounts on foal registration for fillies ?
All the big money series are for 2 & 3yo horses. What about the 4 to 8yo ones. We need more for them, like the Tontine series. Plenty of horses retire not because of bad form but lack of opportunity. The longer an owner can keep racing and getting a return from their horses the better for the industry.

[dizzy]

Using the underutilized compoment of the existing population would make the most sence to me to boost the racing population, which is the critical conpoment of the equation not foal numbers actually.

Will take a little time, but not much time in comparison to reaping the benefits of a boosted foal population. Why not program more mares races but with a different prizemoney split then exists now, ie less to the winner, more money down the line? More opportunities for more individual mares to pay their way should lead to more racing and then finding their way to stud.

[eliteblood]

Using the underutilized compoment of the existing population would make the most sence to me to boost the racing population, which is the critical conpoment of the equation not foal numbers actually.

Will take a little time, but not much time in comparison to reaping the benefits of a boosted foal population. Why not program more mares races but with a different prizemoney split then exists now, ie less to the winner, more money down the line? More opportunities for more individual mares to pay their way should lead to more racing and then finding their way to stud.

What about $1000 say to the highest placed filly/mare

[dizzy]

A bonus proportional to the value of the race to highest placed filly or mare in mixed races if they finish better then mid field would have merit. We would want to reward those performances that have merit, not reward a last place finish by the only female in the field type performance, in ordinary races at least..

The question would be though where does the money come from?

[Termite]

I don't see any need to complicate the issue. Authorities need to be able to plan and budget for any reform and convoluted stake payment scenarios are a nightmare. We currently have races for fillies and mares. Just program more of them!

[nat]

Well put Termite

How do we get you on the panel, all this talk about bonuses and conditions are complicated nonsense, program more fillies and mares races from 2-4 yld make racing a 2-4 a priority for both sex's (50% of owners have a filly or mare so there shouldn't be much of an argument about it) If there is more juvenile racing it would make them more valuable commodity at the sales if you wanted to race and it wouldn't matter so much if it was a colt or filly if they get a fare suck of the lollypop.

[aussiebreno]

[QUOTE=gutwagon;8863]@aussiebreno you think we dont need to breed more foals. If the numbers keep droping it will no longer be viable for the better quality US stallions to come down under( Aus & NZ ) and that would be a disaster for our breed. A shop doesn't stock 1000 cartons of milk if only 300 of them will get sold. Foals are getting bred at the demand; in fact at a surplus to the demand (see my numbers above where each horse who gets to the races need 13 starts a year). The problem isn't foal numbers but rather horse retention. Of course we would love the game to be bigger; but the simple fact of life is it isn't a mainstream sport; we are never (in the current popularity etc) going to get turnover in the billions; prizemoney in the billions and foals bred in the tens of thousands etc. If there was more horse retention then the racing fields and no of meetings could increase. Then the next problem would foal numbers (if they were to still stay low but they would likely increase as demand for foals would increase). But at the moment the problem isn't foal numbers.
Does anyone know if nz foal numbers are also droping ? per mango
aussiebreno you have said you don't breed or own horses, could you tell us what your involvement in the sport is ? I'm not having a go at you , I just want to better understand your position and views. No involvment personally. Relatives both side of the family train/own but ironically my mother and father have zilch involvement. I have no bias towards anything; just doing what is right.
Maybe the pannel could have looked into why so many foals don't make it to the track ? It cant just be because they are fillies or not good enough. I have known many people who never try horses, just leave them in the padock, mostly due to training costs ect.Yep 51% seems high. But of the 49% that do make it to the races they should easily fill the fields out. All about horse retention; not the foal no being born imo. Of which VVV and others have came up with good ideas.[/QUOTE]
Cheers Gutwagon.

[aussiebreno]

Well put Termite

How do we get you on the panel, all this talk about bonuses and conditions are complicated nonsense, program more fillies and mares races from 2-4 yld make racing a 2-4 a priority for both sex's (50% of owners have a filly or mare so there shouldn't be much of an argument about it) If there is more juvenile racing it would make them more valuable commodity at the sales if you wanted to race and it wouldn't matter so much if it was a colt or filly if they get a fare suck of the lollypop.

Well there you go; had not heard the term fare suck before today. Now heard it twice. Although the other time I heard it it was said fair suck of the dim sim