Transparency - Paul Lafferty initiative

www.sportingpost.co.za/2016/09/first-tim...tools/#comment-17187

Sad mindset of entitlement displayed by certain owners. read the comments.

Barrier Trials only way

comments can be used to manipulate

"Nice horse might be green..." might as well just fill in the comments now. Waste of time .... What trainer is going to say ..."So slow I'm embarrassed to take training fees" "Or cost 5 Mil but actually should be gelded to stop it from passing on the slow gene"
Barrier trials the only sensible thing or limit the first-timers to 2 in a pa legs and never in the Jackpot.

Don are you an owner bud ?

used to be... R20 punter and legend hunter now. Are you wanting to point out the costs involved in owning? Don't bother. I know. But that is beside the point.

No Don, my point is simple, the horse belongs to the owner only for the first run thereafter its public domain. Serious punters can just watch the betting. The owner is already very restricted with betting limits so for just one race let them have their moment. How many first-timers win in any case ? IMVHO

I'm all for giving owners first bite at the cherry.
The initiative is good PR but should probably published later, not on the day of acceptances.

The ONLY thing this will achieve is more speculation and insults.

Im long in the tooth in horse racing. Things happen for many reasons.

BUT lets look at Greyhound racing for a while.
There are timed trials
The timed trials are watched
The time trials are recorded

and still

the dog get backed into fav and loses
drifts and wins
never wins
wins 12 in a row


the same will apply to racing and i think in the LONG run this will be worse for our sport.

Let me elaborate even more…

In the USA we have timed workouts and the fastest time is called the BULLET workout

the % of bullet workouts that win is NOT indicative or linked to the bullet work out.

There is something more here that I have raised before without any response so let me try again ................If a parent sends a child for schooling,extra lessons or some other form of training,only the parents are entitled to feedback reports.
Similarly,anybody who contracts with a trainer,to condition and train a racehorse,is the only person entitled to feedback in terms of a payment for a service,and it is their prerogative to share with whoever they choose!
I don't think that a trainer is entitled to provide information to the public,(contract law or common law or whatever),and certainly not,morally,without the express permission of the payer(owners) in respect of such service.This principle is not restricted to first timers!
Would be like walking into a room and finding that everybody has been sent a copy of your child's school report!
A legal opinion would be interesting!

Agree with you totally Rob and expressed this point a few years ago in SPost.
A regular female contributor wrote in and told me I was wrong and the punter deserved to be informed and info was not the sole domain of the owner.
I had many greyhounds in UK and some for a very short time with aTrainer in the MIdlands who could tell me when everybody's dog was expected.Didn't stay with him long.

The owner races for stakes, is not entitled to manipulate a system for benefit at the cost of others. All racing and races, (even first timers) should have equal information out there without blind spots and without any owner or party benefiting from advantage. YOu would be surprised at the stats of unraced/long layoffs winning where there has been movement on the betting last. One is too many. What should punters do? Not bet on that race then? HOw does this help racing, and how does this help stakes and the costs of operations in the long run? Trials are best, and this is why other countries have them. Racing cannot afford to shrink more by way of tracks closing...we need more conversion, more punters, more income, higher stakes etc etc. Better information flow, equal and transparent information through a good system. I agree, a comments system depending on the honesty of trainers/owners is flawed. And will probably highlight one of three things: they know what they're talking about, the horse performs as reported, they don't know what they're talking about, the horse performs contrary to what they have commented, or when no comment, reinforce the belief that racing is crooked.

Rob, the issue is two-fold. If we consider racing a business, then like any business, we need to look after our customers. In terms of the trainer, I agree with you that the owner is his customer. But the current discussion point relates to the punter and how the industry treats him and services his needs as a customer.

In terms of the owner wanting to run his horse - he does so on the understanding that it is in accordance with the rules and regulations of the Operator. And in order to be able to hold racing in the first place, the Operator has to service their customer - the punter. So in fact, in order to race his horse, the owner also has to consider the punter a customer (or at least acknowledge some sort of responsibility towards the punter who is being invited to contribute their hard earned cash in order to stump up owners' prize money).

As such, if we want to continue racing, we have to acknowledge that our punter is our most precious asset and we need to make him feel safe and happy in order to keep coming back and buying our product (i.e. betting). We do this by giving that customer the best possible service we can (in this case, information). It is a hackneyed example, but look at Hong Kong. Timed workouts which are all made available to the public, time trials for every horse - again, information which is made public. As you point out, a timed workout or time trial is not necessarily an absolute, but it is information that a punter can use (or choose not to use) in order to base a decision on. After all, there is money at stake.

The point is not for the trainer, the owner or even the operator to exercise judgement and say HERE! THIS HORSE!! The point is to give equal impartial information on each and every horse so that our customers, the punters, all have access to equal information so that they can and hopefully will make informed decisions at the tote window, thereby providing us with the revenue we need to keep the game going.

The only snag here is that it's an 'honesty box' system and will only be as good as the information supplied. If we supply good information, customers might have a little success and be encouraged to come back. If we supply rubbish information, they will feel they are simply being made bigger fools at owners and trainers' expense. That is bad for business as they will go elsewhere.

To put it a different way, if you went to a supermarket and bought a pack of what was labelled beef burgers only to find out later that the supermarket was lying to you and selling you zebra meat, you would have every right to be angry and never to go shopping there again. Why do we expect the racing customer to accept anything less?

No-one is holding a gun to a trainer's head in terms of the information he/she shares. A simple 'is working well / is coming along slowly / has only been in work for 3 months / has had a virus' is not unfair information and can only help a punter feel a little more comfortable or secure in whether or not to put their money down. Asking someone for the well being of a horse is quite a different question to asking whether they can or even should have a punt and perhaps it's important to make that distinction.

I was an owner until recently and I understand where you are coming from, so please don't think I am being rude or dismissive of your point of view - I am not. However, as a matter of interest, it has been a very long time since I have felt the desire to put money on a horse race, precisely because as a (potential) customer, I don't feel there is adequate information for me to base a decision on. Isn't that also food for thought?