MICHAEL BEATTIE'S NORTHERN RIVERS NOTEBOOK

By Michael Beattie | Thursday, October 17, 2019

The Northern Rivers Notebook is the personal blog of the well-respected racing administrator Michael Beattie who is the CEO of the Clarence River Jockey Club and the Secretary of the Northern Rivers Racing Association. The Northern Rivers Notebook is exclusive to HRO and will appear on a regular basis with Michael cataloguing his overview of some of the features of racing in the Northern Rivers jurisdiction of New South Wales Racing as well as covering other pertinent issues as they arise. Here Michael looks back at the month of September and then turns his focus to The Kosciuszko. This is The Northern Rivers Notebook.

September was an interesting month for Northern Rovers racing with the Ballina Cup removed from the Spring racing schedule for the first time in many, many years.

The theory behind that came from the Ballina Club itself. They believed it would suit them better to have a stand-alone Cup meeting at a time of the year when there are more people in the region given that, like so many country areas, they were having difficulty sustaining their half day holiday.

I would say it is really good thinking by the club. They put that proposal forward to Racing NSW who was supportive of the change.

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That left us with just the Lismore Cup and the Bowraville Cup run in the month of September and I think it is sad that these two race meetings are run only two days apart.

On Cup day Lismore effective run three race on the program for horses at the top of their level … being the Rousillon over 1500m, the Untamed over 1200m and the Lismore Cup over 2100m. Bowraville, two days later, endeavour to run two open company races … the Lightning over 1000m and the Bowraville Cup over 1350m.

The difficulty here is that out of smallest pool of horses we are trying to fill five races. That is just not achievable and I think we need to look closely at those dates … especially now that Ballina is no longer in the mix.

It is probably time to revisit that situation.

It would make sense for Bowraville to be moved and become more of a lead-up meeting to the Lismore Cup meeting with horses then being able to go from the Lightning into the Untamed and from the Bowraville Cup into the Rousillon.

That possibility is something I think the industry should look at very closely.

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The other thing worthy of mention about the Lismore Cup is that the Club’s innovative CEO, Scott Jones, trialled running many of his bars as cashless.

You purchased a card and then used that card to make your purchases at the bar during the day.

I thought it was great that a club like Lismore that has a very young demographic … it is a university town … decided to trial something that, admittedly was not something that traditionalists would like, but it goes to show that we do have club’s prepared to investigate different ways to improve the race-day experience for patrons.

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It is a huge day for country racing at Randwick on Saturday with the running of The Kosciuszko.

The marketing of the race has been outstanding. I don’t think there can be any doubt about that.

The concept, where you buy $5 tickets to go into a draw and if you come out a winner you are entitled to select a horse in the race on your and others behalf, goes right to the core of the Australian punter’s psyche … that is to make a small investment with the possibility of a really big payday.

That works … because it is what every punter is always looking to do … to back a 100-1 winner.

So much is left in the domain of the winning ticket holders to work out which horses they want in the race.

It is interesting that the core of the field is made up of a number of runners from the race last year which is a great credit to their trainers who have kept the longevity of those horses going but there are obviously new contenders who have joined the mix.

I think it is absolutely fantastic for racing.

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I would obviously love it if a Northern Rivers horses wins it again but regardless of that, taking that bias away, it is a race that creates so much interest at a reginal level that it is quite amazing.

Every horse in the race has its story. Tarbert, for example, is the story of a significant owner who invested fairly heavily in purchasing tickets in the hope of having one of his tickets drawn as a winner and then being able to choose his horse … and he was able to do that and pick his own horse.

How amazing would that result be if Tarbert gets home … but, as I say, that is just one of many wonderful stories that could be told of the owners, trainers and horses going into big race.

It is a concept that is just going to get better and better and better and it will continue to lift the interest in country horses and therefore in country racing in NSW.

There is a real transition option now. Everybody hopes to get a horse good enough to win a Highway. If you’ve got a horse good enough to win a Highway, you say, I’m going to put it away and try and win the Country Championships. Then, if you’ve been successful at the Country Championships you’ll look to try and win The Kosciuszko.

That just has to be great for the game.

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I know some people have brought up the fact that, while country owners and trainers can get their moment in the sun with The Kosciuszko, country jockeys do not really feature in the final line-up.

Going for the best jockeys, in almost every case you can think of, is the reality of the racing world and it is not just unique to the Country Championships or The Kosciuszsko.

If you take things to the other extreme and, let’s just say, they brought in conditions that you had to be a country based jockey to ride in the Kosciusko … how does that affect jockeys like Grant Buckley and Robert Thompson who are provincial jockeys who support country racing and who might have been riding a Kosciusko horse right through its preparation and then suddenly find themselves ineligible to ride in the Kosciuszko itself.

That would be ludicrous … which is why no such restriction is in place.

It is difficult enough to get into a ‘grand final’ so it seems fair enough for connections to have the right to choose a rider who they think will give them the best chance of victory in what, for some, might be a once in a lifetime opportunity.

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