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a racing forum in "we don’t like something racing for change did" shocker!
does it really change your life if the trainers & jockeys have their christian names on the race card?
or is it the Great British tradition of moaning for moaning’s sake?
get a life
Sandown must be in doubt now (7.30am inspection tomorrow).
It chucked it down yesterday, again this morning before a brief respite this afternoon & now chucking it down again. I’m a few miles from the course & it’s practically been dark here all day
reet hard
27 Dec 2010, 02:57
DEEP SENSATION WROTE:
It’s been quite funny reading the nonsense from "grown men" who can’t seem to accept that the weather has been very cold (in winter, of all times) and racing, along with other sports, has been hit badly by the weather.No one dies if a meeting is abandoned. If the weather means that races like the King George are lost, then so be it.
What does anyone think they are going to achieve by venting your spleen on a forum just because the weather has been incredibly bad this winter?
DS
A few things which may have escaped your attention:A/ This is a Racing Forum, so it should be unsurprising there’s adverse comment, on one of the sport’s biggest days of the year – when there’s no racing.
It’s not adverse comments, it moaning
B/ Being "grown men", most of its members are conversant with the current weather situation, its effect on sport generally, and on horse racing in particular.
Reading the majority of comments on here, it appears that these "grown men" can’t accept that the weather has beaten a lot of things, not just racing (airports, roads, other sporting events etc). The moaning from various posters (on here & other forums) comes across like a spoilt child moaning that they can’t have any more sweets!
C/ If races like the King George are lost, it’s again hardly surprising that the above membership would express a view that it should be re-arranged, given not only its annual importance in the racing calendar, but also – in this particular year – its potential contribution to racing history. It’s also fair comment that the situation was widely predicted, and, with just a little foresight, could have been ameliorated somewhat by the provision of at least one decent AW meeting.
While it’s disappointing if the King George is lost, it’s hardly the end of the world, is it? There are much more important things in life to worry about. As for "foresight" as per usual on a forum, foresight is only mentioned AFTER the event, not before. Can I ask what experience, if any, do the members of this forum have in running a racecourse or looking after several acres of turf, to keep it in tip-top condition?
D/ It’s common knowledge that punters have very little voice in racing matters, and fairly well recognised that TRF is one of the better places for that body to air their grievances with at least some hope of racing’s rulers actually reading, if not always responding.
ah, the poor old punters don’t get a voice line. Do you really think anyone from the betting industry reads this & thinks "ooh, we better change things, the punters are posting on a forum and they don’t like what we’re doing"? The people who come out with that nonsense really do need to grow up & come back to the real world
Of course, being an open forum, it often attracts those with little constructive to say, some of whom try to big themselves up with supercilious nonsense, but that’s a price well worth paying, if threads like this eventually make a difference.
And it’s about time these people (who really should have their keyboards taken away from them) grew up & realised that while they have every right to have an opinion, they really should keep it to themselves & not post it on the world wide web!
Happy Christmas!
Ditto
It’s been quite funny reading the nonsense from "grown men" who can’t seem to accept that the weather has been very cold (in winter, of all times) and racing, along with other sports, has been hit badly by the weather.
No one dies if a meeting is abandoned. If the weather means that races like the King George are lost, then so be it.
What does anyone think they are going to achieve by venting your spleen on a forum just because the weather has been incredibly bad this winter?
I’m about 5 miles away. I’ve been checking the weather constantly & it’s changing all the time. The latest one for between now & Boxing Day isn’t good. Heavy snow forecast for Tuesday then snow again in the afternoon on King George day itself. Top temperature is 0c (Xmas Day) with lows of -7 on various days/nights.
All of this is from http://www.theweatheroutlook.com – they are pretty good with the long range forecasts but they have been saying that the weather could go either way in the next week or so and it is changing day by day, although not for the better at the moment
My guess is the main worry will be the snow on top of the covers. It doesn’t look like we are going to get temperatures high enough to melt it & there could be more snow on the way on Tuesday & Boxing Day.
Nope – mainly because I have a financial interest. One of the Graham’s does me quite nicely. McCoy is the wrong price & should be a lay, perhaps backing back when he drifts.
As for this nonsense about "racing fans MUST vote for him for the good of the sport" perhaps someone can tell me the effect of Zara Phillips winning it had on Eventing? More TV Coverage? No! More newspaper coverage? No! More people interested in the sport? I don’t think so!
I’m quite looking forward to the fall out from RFC, Forums etc when / if AP doesn’t win. The doom and gloom is going to be laughable.
By centralising, I mean the racing industry devising, managing and running its own betting product(s) with profits going directly back into racing. The "scratch card" idea would have a portion of income diverted to charities.
Good idea Cav, although the TOTE should already be going that! Can you see a time when anything like you suggest happens?
As for Roy & Coward (what is his reason for not doing the live debate on Sky tonight? Coward by name?), well it’s a mess!
On the one hand we have the BHA, Horsemen & racecourses bleating about how bookmakers & Betfair don’t pay back enough to racing.
And on the other hand, we have the chairman of the BHA investing into Betfair, the Horsemen praising Betfair for their generous donation and the racecourse praising the bookies for their sponsorship of the top races. Oh, and opening up their private boxes so Betfair customers can bet in running!
Well for a start i dont work for the bha or any racing organisation nor am i racing expert or a marketing expert, but if you tink that racing does not need to catch up on the likes of football or darts popularity wise then your kidding yourself!!
Anyone who knows anything about racing knows that you want as much information as possible in order to pick out the winners but for people who know nothing of the sport looking at the bookies display must be like reading ancient eygtian scriptures, i know it was for me and it took me a while to get to grips with it all.
Other aspects in racing such as handicapping for example can be confusing to new comers, you are told the theory is that all the horses should really be finishing in a blanket finish yet we have ten lenght winners every day of the week so does it really work that well!!
Its all about getting people interested in the first instance, get more people gambling and going to meetings, not just the big ones but the bread and butter smaller meetings too!! A mon avis!!
Well the racecourses are doing a fairly good job of getting people going to the races. It’s been said on this thread several times, racing is the second most attended sporting event in the country etc.
However if you read this, or other forums, or the letters page in the RP, the only young people racecourses are attracting are lager fuelled hooligans who are not interested in watching the races or having a bet (it is of course total paranoia that belongs in the Daily Mail).
The fact is, the people going should have a good day out & want to come back again, even if it is to see Westlife. Some of them may even want to come back because they want to get interested in the racing.
It seems that the "genuine racing fan" loves to trot out the statistic of how "we’re the second most attended sport etc" when accused of being a minority sport. Yet, when discussing who goes racing & what the racecourses are doing to get people into the grandstands, it’s nothing but moaning about how many people are there who are not interested in the horses! They can’t have it both ways!
As for what you say about the form & races etc, surely that’s part of the learning curve of whatever it is that gets us interested?
Any sport or hobby that we participate in or watch starts off being alien to us. But something can grab our attention & make us put in the time & effort to get more enjoyment out of it.
I do agree that the racing post could print the form in a different format but not only would that change years of tradition (OMG, not CHANGE???!!!) but would probably involve plenty of costs for the RP.
I hear you about the handicapping system but I think that is something that won’t change for a very long time.
One of my students has a PT job in a bookies. He says that it’s only old people that bet on horses in there, all the young ones go on football etc. He reckons that racing is in big trouble & needs to work hard to attract a younger audience or it will be dead in a generation. Frightening thought.
Racing needs to move with the times and get young people interested, glam it up a bit and make it more appealing, its time to move foward and forget the old fuddy duddys who tink that just beacause its been around so long it will keep going forever, its time to make some new traditions and make racing a bit racier!!
Also racing needs to be made easier to understand and more accessible, most are put off as they feel its too complicated!!
So how would you make racing more appealing to the young?
And how would you make racing easier to understand?
The current scenario has been entirely predictable and until racing gets people in who understand punters and
starts taking major steps to centralise the betting
and offer a product(s) attractive to its betting customers, their screwed.
Cav, what do you mean by the sentence I’ve highlighted?
anthonycutt
30 Oct 2010, 15:05
It matters not a jot which one has the higher viewing figures, it’s cheaper to send Colin Murray & a couple of cameras to Hull than it is to pay SIS for the feed from Ascot. Even more so if they send their own cameras.I don’t see how we can possibly complain to be honest.
For those who don’t have Sky, racing is on every Saturday. Darts fans without Sky get their sport twice a year on free tv & this World Masters is only a recent addition.That said, there has been darts, motor racing & cricket on ITV4 this year. Things are getting better for sport on free tv, just not from the Beeb.
Becher Chase live on BBC on November 21st by the way. Anyone know if that was always in their plans? The way the website advertises it makes it look like it’s a late addition.
just to be pedantic, but where can I get this "free tv" please? I have to pay a licence fee to watch bbc et all (is it around £120 pa now?) I’ve always found it funny that people seem to think TV is free
I was shaking my head in disbelief when I heard that Paul Roy’s company were buying shares in Betfair. It’s hard to defend the BHA, RFC etc when a chairman goes and does something like that. It just makes everyone think Roy etc are all in it for themselves!
As for Paul Dixon’s "fighting talk", which day do we think the owners will strike on?
A busy Saturday with top prize money available and the top owners & stables having their better horses running? Or a quiet midweek day where it’s the small owner that will be denied the chance of a win and some prize money helping to pay the expenses?
moving away from the original hysterical paranoid point that "genuine racing fans" see anyone who goes racing but isn’t interested in the gee-gees is a drunken hooligan just waiting to start a fight, lets deal with Zilzal’s comments.
Zilzal says we are missing the point by talking about the increased attendances but not the decrease in betting turnover. We’re not missing the point, Zil, they are just different points and this is where racing has a conundrum.
As I’ve pointed out, several times, there aren’t enough racing fans to go to the racecourse each day for the courses to be able to sustain their business. So they have to look at other avenues at getting people through the gates. In my mind they are doing a great job & that is borne out by the facts & figures.
Now Zilzal correctly points out where the money going? On one hand, the racecourses are patting themselves on the back & boasting about increased attendances, on the other hand they are moaning about the lack of prize money on offer from the levy. They can’t have it both ways. I don’t know the ins & outs of levy payments but on the face of it I would suggest that racecourses will now have to contribute more to the levy, from the money generated by increased attendances, rather than paying their share holders first.
While I’m on the subject of the levy, when we read the comments from racing & bookmakers it’s all doom & gloom and no one is betting on racing any more. But is that really the case? Certainly bookmaker’s levy contributions has gone down. but is that because of less money being bet on horse racing or because of less bets being part of the levy process?
What I mean by that is; the major bookmakers have found a wonderful loop hole that now means that, by moving their business off-shore, any bets placed on their website or phone service are not part of the levy. How many of us "genuine racing fans" put most, if not all, of our bets online, over the phone, or with Betfair? Those bets used to be part of the levy, now they are not.
Genuine racing fans have no real need to go racing as we have 2 dedicated tv channels, so we’re not really supporting the courses. Genuine racing fans no longer need to go to the high st bookie to place a bet, so we’re no longer supporting the levy.
Racing has some interesting times ahead.
I hear you Zilzal and I have some thoughts about that. Don’t have time now but will post later
OK I give up. Despite the facts that
A. Racecourses don’t advertise "come to the races, drink as much as you possibly can & then start a load of fights" the "genuine racing fan" thinks they do, so it must be true.
B. There have been something like 1200 race meetings already this year with very few, if any, incidents of drunken, violent behaviour at the races. But the "genuine racing fan" says everyone who isn’t interested in the horses is a piss head who will start trouble once he has enough beer inside him, so it must be true.
Of course let’s not mention the Cheltenham Festival, where around 40k genuine racing fans spend 4 days getting as drunk as possible, start fights, urinate wherever they can etc. A friend of mine was at the Festival a few years ago & witnessed a guy piss on the guy in front of him in the stands because he was too drunk to make it to the loos in time & didn’t want to lose his space in the grandstand.
I’m sure the guy who suddenly had a warm feeling down the back of his legs was very pleased it was a "genuine racing fan" who was pissing on him, rather than some oike who was only there to see the band on afterwards!
you seem to be missing my points max:
1. Not every normal person who goes racing for a day out at the races, but isn’t interested in the horses, gets totally pissed out of their brains & starts trouble.
2. You, Barry Hills & Laura may have paid £25 – £80 to get in (actually Barry won’t have paid anything & I’ll assume Laura has a press badge) but can’t you understand that the economics don’t add up? Racing fans alone cannot keep racecourses open! There just isn’t enough of them.
This attitude of "we don’t like outsiders, who want to enjoy themselves but aren’t bothered about the horses" comes across as snobbish. The racing media are as much guilty of this as the few people who posts on this & other forums.
As I’ve pointed out earlier, that view is held by a minority of "racing fans" but they are being the most vocal and get the most air-time & print space.
The interesting thing is, the moaners haven’t offered up any ideas how racecourses get bums on seats. As usual, the Great British tradition of moaning for moaning’s sake is evident.
So here’s a test for you or anyone else on here.
You are now the managing director of a racecourse. Last year you had concerts & 30 thousand people attending your racecourse, paying £30 each for a ticket each meeting, of which you had 3.
You’ve now decided to scrap the concerts because a handful of your "genuine racing fans" have moaned that there are too many people there that are not interested in some brown things running up & down a field.
So here’s your mission: how do you replace around 27 thousand people for each of those 3 nights & the money they spent?
To crunch some numbers, 30k x £30 = £900,000. Times that by 3 = £2,700,000 – not calculating the money spent behind the bar, food halls, tote etc.
Now that 3k "genuine racing fans" can wander at their leisure, you now have an income of: 3k x £30 = £270, 000 x 3 = £810, 000.
So how do you make up the £1,890,000 difference?
Instead of moaning about how those horrible "normal people" are prepared to come to "your" sport and enjoy themselves, how about coming up with some ideas about how racecourses get bums on seats?
