The end of the world came and went on Saturday without much ado. It was just another raceday really with the usual suspects plying their passion in smoky tote outlets, spending the rent money and making their wives really happy. There is nothing to worry about though. I reckon there is probably more chance of our horseracing fathers adopting a public relations and communications policy that serves its long-suffering customers than a cataclysmic end to mankind as we know it.
I often wonder if the decision makers and policy boffins, or should that be buffoons, that govern the game of horseracing realise just how many punters, and owners too, have done their lives and boots in the name of an undying love for the sport of kings. The detractors and ex-wives club will call it an addiction but believe me, this smouldering lust that us die-hards know so well and feel every day exists only in the hazy blue environs of Loftus Versfeld and in the realms of the movies. We listened to Liefling and we saw and related to the Fatal Attractions and Basic Instincts and we understood it. It is difficult to rationalise or even begin to try and explain the nature of the marriage that exists in this passionate relationship that borders on the exotic and extraordinarly erotic. It is an emotional and physical roller-coaster that exceeds anything. Freud and Einstein would have struggled to put it in a box and label it. It is an inexplicable phenomenon. Simple. Yet not.
And this is just why one thinks that the power pirates should be treating us customers a little nicer than they do. Examples of this are in abundance and this was vividly illustrated again at Turffontein on 10 May, where the meeting was abandoned after the running of the third race with little more than an announcement and a kick up the bum for punters. They just don’t seem to care.
The depth of business expertise, intellect and racing knowledge is well documented in the cyber corridors of the horseracing chat forums. Sure some guys seem to talk a lot of hogwash but it is their constitutional right to freedom of expression – and if you choose to make a monkey of yourself, then you certainly are not the first and won’t be the last. A regular poster on the Scotfreeracing website is retired Insurance wizard Rob Faux, who regularly posts his considered and very informed opinion. I have never met him but I do know that he has owned and bred horses and has been around racing for over four decades. That’s a helluva long time. I emailed Rob to get his permission to partly utilise a posting he made recently and which makes for interesting debate, in my opinion:
23 May: Is the criticism warranted?
“ Whenever criticism is levelled at the industry,there are those who defend the situation with comments like”they can’t help the weather” and “we are talking about horses,not machines”.
A fair assessment would be to find “apples with apples” comparisons so lets find a couple.
1)Singapore has not lost a meeting for 10 years,even after experiencing 45+mm of rain. FFS when our lot go over for their fun and piss ups, surely spending a little time learning the secret of how they achieve that would make some sense,or is that unreasonable? To lose more meetings a month than they do in a decade would suggest we have something to learn! “
The startling statistics on Singapore was apparently obtained from Debbie Hawkins who now works for the Singapore Turf Club. It makes us look silly and how is it possible that a key international player like South Africa is lagging so far behind?
On the Turffontein evening in question, there were seven races on the card and the PA thus kicked off in the first race with the Pick Six in the second. We know that a dividend is only declared after a minum of two legs of the exotic is run. After the second race, the heavens opened and the third race was delayed for a substantial period. It was eventually run and then followed by a rather convenient jockey protest. If I was paid as well as they are I probably wouldn’t want to work on a cold Tuesday evening either, so with no further rain in the interim period the meeting was, hardly surprisingly, abandoned. And Saftote took their 22% odd chop / takeout of the PA and Pick Six pools – with many punters left sucking the hind tit as the PA paid only R1-20 and the Pick R6-30. A few knowledgeable racing folk have expressed the opinion that very few punters will make a profit after only two legs of an exotic is run and this brings to discussion the debate as to why Saftote are entitled to a 100% of their takeout on a bet which only, in this instance, completed 32% of its course in the case of the Pick Six and 42% in the case of the PA. Surely it amounts to extortion and an unfair practise? Nobody was to blame for the weather, but why should the customer bear the brunt of it?
What peeves me the most, beyond the unfair mathematics, is that the whole incident was handled like a silent comedy movie. The customers were not just kept informed. We didn’t exist. We were eventually subjected to televised pictures of a group of tall and short men doing a thing called ‘track inspection’ while kicking their heels into the turf and later gesticulating wildly at each other. A lip reader may have come away with more than most of us. This was followed by a curt announcement – meeting abandoned. In other words, ‘we got our money, so you suckers come back for a little more of this tomorrow…’ Where was the live camera and the local PR guy or Duty Manager telling us what was going on? Sitting enjoying a free meal and bottle of wine upstairs in the restaurant? Seriously guys, what must we the punting public think? And maybe if one or two of those very conscientious objectors had to vent their selfish opinion(that’s how most of us see it) on camera, then maybe they would think twice about it – or just maybe we would understand it all a little better? It is called communication and customer care. Not foreign concepts, really.
As Rob Faux quips – ‘we are not complaining because we hate racing. We are opening our mouths and voicing our opinion because we love it….’
The question is, when is somebody going to listen?
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Eyes Of The World
Derreck David has teamed up again, after a break of a few months, with the Jaap Visser outfit in Kimberley and the young Johannesburg-based rider has had a fair measure of success with this relatively small training operation. After being hugged and kissed by Joanne Visser in the unsaddling enclosure after he had steered Eye Of The World to an emphatic win in the Racing Express Pinnacle Stakes at Flamingo Park on Monday, a half-coy Derreck quipped: “ It is great riding for people who love their horses so much. Joanne cries here eyes out after every win…” It’s called refreshing down-to-earth humility and I wish a few more people would show this unbridled emotion and honesty.
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Hoarse Men
Pierre Jourdan returned to racing at Turffontein on Saturday after a six month break and ran a brilliant race to go down narrowly to the very capable now fifteen-time winner, Earl Of Surrey. Besides being a huge feather in the cap for the training skills of the Gary Alexander Racing Team, he also kicked sand in the face of the on-course Tellytrack presenters, who had nothing good to say about him on the way to post and cautioned punters left, right and centre. These are the same guys who just two races earlier had stuck us into a ‘great value place bet’ in Strike Paradise. Hopefully Strike Paradise would have passed the post before this weekend’s SP hits the streets. I really wouldn’t want their thankless jobs but overconfidence is a dangerous approach in a game that tames lions. It also reaffirms the thought that the post-race previews don’t promote betting turnover or serve any useful purpose and without real horsemen in jockeys or trainers doing the assessments, are just filler ‘entertainment’ or coffee breaks, most of the time. Give me the Molly PA anyday.
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Cape Conquers
The Big Four! Mike Bass, Dean Kannemeyer, Glen Kotzen and Joey Ramsden. That is the trainer finishing order in the Cape’s clean sweep of the Listed East Coast Handicap on Sunday at Clairwood. Senior statesman Mike Bass might not have the power of the pocket that he had last year, but he has a few strings to his bow – including the brilliant What A Winter who should win the Golden Horse Casino Sprint on Saturday. The quietly spoken Dean Kannemeyer already has a fifty percent win strike rate on the East Coast with a small string and sends Splash Gold to post in the big sprint on Saturday for Mr Lucky Owner himself, Ray Deacon, and partners and has a few other aces up his immaculately attired sleeves. The ever jovial Glen Kotzen has been sending out the winners of late after a quiet spell and always pulls a Graded race or three out of the bag. Golfing legend Joey Ramsden, like Justin Snaith, operates very profitably in the three coastal centres and has had an amazing run in the last few months with Bravura unexpectedly throwing his name back into the mix with a low-profile return to winning ways at Clairwood on Sunday. So while one could be forgiven for thinking that Gauteng is the centre of the racing universe after watching a screening of the recent rather melodramatic Highveld Racing Awards, it is patently obvious where, politics aside, the true strength of South African horseracing lies. Pomp, splendour and ra ra are one thing. Results are another. Beyond the KZN challenge of Mike De Kock and Dennis Drier, the Gauteng Champions Season challenge looks just that – challenged.
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Dirty Pics?
Neurotic , cynical, hallucinatory? I am probably a combination of the aforementioned three conditions most of the time. But a strange little thing happened recently. After watching the replay of the fourth race at Kenilworth on 4 May, I diarised to have a look at the photo-finish sometime in the future on Tabgold, as I wasn’t convinced about the third and fourth positions as declared by the judge. Imagine my surprise when I went on to Tabgold over the weekend to have a peek…you guessed it – Serge Blanco! That just also happens to be the only photo-finish in that period that is missing. Peanut Butter Conspiracy theory, pure coincidence or the imagination of a fertile semi-disturbed(or so they think…) mind? I could be way off the mark but you be the judge…
