The Merit Rating Appeal by connections of Daily News winner Green With Envy against the increase in his merit rating from 123 to 127 after the Daily News was dismissed on Monday 3rd June 2024, and the deposit forfeited.
Khaya Stables Manager Jehan Malherbe and Trainer Dean Kannemeyer issued a joint media statement on Tuesday 4 June 2024.
The statement says that effectively, NHRA appointed adjudicators, Karel Miedema, Gabriel Soma and Aveen Sewpersad sided with the official assessor, Lennon Maharaj.
Green With Envy (Craig Zackey) holds off a determined Serino Moodley and the progressive Flag Man (Pic – Chase Liebenberg)
For many observers, that’s the end of the story.The official handicappers wielded the powers vested in them and have subsequently been vindicated by an Appeal Board. In doing so, the connections of Green With Envy have forcefully been put in their place and shown up as self- interested chancers.
That does not convey anything like the full picture, however. Several cogent, well researched arguments were advanced by Khaya Stables and Dean Kannemeyer Racing, stating the case for Green with Envy to be kept at the same rating.
After all he was officially rated to win going into the Daily News and only just scrambled home from vastly improved Flag Man in a messy, false run affair.
International best practice under such circumstances is to err on the side of caution and use the winner as the line horse – not go back down the field and pluck soundly defeated horses for that purpose. Reason being is that by constantly choosing well-beaten line horses, over time the ratings become inflated, (a form of “bracket-creep”) which undermines the integrity and legitimacy of the figures.
The official handicapper has justified his decision (using his own set of ratings, of course) and was utterly contemptuous of any alternative viewpoints in his written response.
We don’t want to be seen as sore losers but a careful analysis of the arguments we advanced, none of which unfortunately had any impact on the panel who dealt with the query, deserve a public airing.
Waiting on confirmation of the Gr1 Daily News 2000 victory ( Pic – Chase Liebenberg)
Consider the following – then you be the judge:
The line horse in the Daily News, Mid Winter Wind, unproven past 1400m had, in fact been raised in the KZN Guineas. Those Guineas ratings are in themselves questionable with Green with Envy coming off an excellent G1 Cape Derby score, being bumped up in the G2 Guineas, despite it being another false run race.
Well exposed three-year-old, Hluhluwe was another to be hiked up after the Guineas, together with Navajo Nation (beaten in a handicap at his previous start) who was increased by 7 points.
Questions must therefore be asked about the validity of those Guineas ratings. Now, to further compound the problem, a horse raised in suspect circumstances and a query over ten furlongs, Mid Winter Wind, gets used as the line horse in the Daily News.
This results in another jump for Green With Envy, together with a massive jump for Flag Man a mere two weeks after his previous rating was attained. As if this should not get the alarm bells ringing, well exposed Highveld horse, Barberesco, who suffered severe interference in a rough Daily News, is also subjected to a 13-point boost.
Hluhluwe virtually dislocated his jockey’s shoulder after pulling badly and drifting wide around the Greyville turn so a rational observer would think he ran below par, yet the official handicappers have pegged him as running close to his rating. Such is the knock- on effect of these questionable increases.
Likewise, Hotarubi was also hopelessly wide on the turn throughout, suggesting that he too could not deliver a personal best under those circumstances. Yet with these new OMR increases, he runs almost to his rating, in the official handicappers’ eyes, that is.
This begs the question – did the handicappers watch the flow of the race and interpret the result soundly and judiciously, given an uneven pace. Evidence was led showing that the Daily News was the fourth slowest in the last 17 running’s.
And a sophisticated interpretation of the fractional times showed finishing ratios typical of a race not run at anywhere close to a true pace throughout. A 100% ratio of a finishing segment relative to the final time would indicate an exactly evenly run race. Less than that, say 96%, would suggest tiring, decelerating horses feeling the effects of a strong early pace.
In the case of the 2000m Daily News, where the final sectionals were super- swift for the distance, the first three ran the 400m to finish segment in around 22.5 seconds, which computes to a sky-high 110% of the final time.
The handicappers stubbornly chose to ignore this factual evidence of a stop start, messy affair where many horses endured tough trips.
Green with Envy returned bashed about and bruised, with Pure Predator injured in running. Regardless, the handicappers literally took an aggressive view to bump up the OMRs of the principals.
Opinions are the life blood of this fascinating brain game. Even experts with years of experience are constantly learning new things; must concede points when they get things wrong, and ideally should adopt a humble rather than dogmatic approach.
“Much is unknowable, and we are not as smart as we think,” can be a guiding maxim in horse racing where no individual, or official for that matter, is bigger than the game.
Our abiding concern, however, is that the official handicappers are so hell bent on preserving the sanctity of Grade 1’s in SA that they nearly always inflate ratings regardless of what took place in these races.
Using their own, often flawed, ratings to justify their own, often flawed ratings is a compounding exercise in folly. When confronted by an alternative take on things they tend to come out in uber- defensive mode with guns blazing.
On previous occasions, when engaging in polite discussion about the ratings of Khaya Stable’s horses we have been rudely rebuffed without a hint of the handicapper even considering a dissenting viewpoint.
Whilst graciously accepting the ruling, we feel strongly that our case, far from being a devious, misguided attempt to gain an unfair advantage as the official handicapper provocatively believes, has legitimate grounds.
Craig Zackey and Green With Envy await the resolution of the Stipes review after the Daily News 2000 (Pic – Chase Liebenberg)
Though we are now ready to move on, the decision to withhold the Merit Rating Appeal deposit rankles, and smacks of punitive over-reach. The forfeit of the deposit makes us wonder if there is underlying vindictiveness towards Khaya Stables.
To mitigate against any possible bias and mere rubber-stamping of the official line at follow up enquiries, perhaps the local Appeal Panel should be scrapped and in future, appeals be heard by internationally respected handicappers.
Beyond the individual merits of this Green With Envy case, which was always going to lead to spirited debate given the implications for the forming of Hollywoodbets Durban July weights, this dispute raises much deeper and substantive concerns about the official process, and application of handicapping principles in South Africa.
- Joint media release by Khaya Stables Manager Jehan Malherbe and Trainer Dean Kannemeyer on Tuesday 4 June 2024.
