4Racing announced recently that it plans to schedule an additional six race meetings during August across Gauteng and the Eastern Cape.
Here is the press release for background.
Clinton Binda writes in the Sporting Post Mailbag. that while it is good news to see blank days filled with new meetings, and it is also good to see 4Racing catering to the lower rated horses, albeit at equally low stakes, this does highlight the poor planning of the programme regarding how it flows.
In previous seasons we saw the programme spread races for lower rated horses, giving marginal animals a constant trickle of opportunity to at least earn some income while filling races and providing extra opportunities for punters to bet.
Having large gaps between races for the lower rated gallopers means that these horses, who would otherwise be running more often than higher rated horses would want to, stand in boxes. And this when races have an all-time record low entries.
If we want to keep the population up, then a steady trickle of events is much better than clumping a bunch of races in distant and expensive months to come, while a local off-season is catering to Graduation and Progress plates rather than to the majority of the horse population.
I was on the committee when the Assessment Plates were introduced to try and fatten up those small fielded and poor betting races, and I regret that we passed those races which were out of place for the greater good of racing in general.
Fortunately, in the face of reality they faded away to nothing anyway.
It is way past time that we look at the real numbers on the ground – that is the stats rather than opinions, and maximise the programme to fit the participants.
Please read the Power Of Ratings for more background
