As If Racing Wasn't Already In The Doldrums...

Vaal 24 April

Race 1:Mdn Juv Plt

20 runners 13 unraced

Race 2:Staying Mdn 2400m

I could run 2400m quicker than half of these.

Race 3:Progress Hcp

Race 4: MR 62 FM Hcp

Race 5: MR 72 Apprentice Hcp

Race 6: MR 76 Hcp

Race 7: MR 66 Apprentice Hcp

Race 8: MAIDEN HCP

Race 9: MAIDEN HCP

Phumelela may have to stage race meetings to cater for agreements with International Partners,but it's no wonder local punters have moved on to other forms of gambling.Somehow PGE can't work out why pools aren't growing.The game can't survive without local punters,and this sort of meeting is no better than the crap Greyville poly cards we have to deal with each week.

What a load of croc!I'll give the tote a miss on Tuesday thanks.

JHB Racing is already too hard

Bob Brogan wrote: JHB Racing is already too hard

Wonder whose idea a 'Maiden Handicap' is ?

I have to agree - I battle when they have programes such as these . When you have high division cards the cream rises to the top , but when we are having 52 Handicaps it becomes a bag of bad horses and form goes out the window . I understand that they all need a chance to race but this is chasing the local punter away .

How ironic was it to watch the Vaal yesterday and then at the same time see the Newmarket meeting which was top class - in between the French racing .

I used to play every day - now I have trashed Kimberley - Fairview Poly and Greyville Poly and now Vaal mid week is looking on its way out . So when are we going to play on a Saturday and maybe on a Sunday if the card looks to give us a fair chance.

Oh shit. Another loss day coming :0

Only for some . There are very good punters on this site that read Poly cards and give great opinions , but not for me .

My 5 cents worth as punter you have to treat each racing centre as a separate business and what i mean is through decades of punting i have cut down to concentrating on natal and gauteng racing and leave eastern northern and western cape alone although i might watch those centres especially western cape as those horses can still race in the other 2 centres i punt on...i found through the years that the returns i got from the 3 capes were not worth the time and effort i put into those meetings and port elizabeth was a major loss centre for me and i would rather increase my spend on gauteng and natal racing where i believe i have a better success rate ..it also gives me time to breath in between meetings having 1 or maybe 2 days off ...the poly track and both grass tracks at turfontein are my favourite when it comes to punting and i dont have a problem with the race program that is served up because as a punter you need to adapt your betting strategies and patterns to them..Each to their own i think

It's a fact that punters generally prefer to bet on better quality events. The exception to this rule is possibly if a wide awake player thinks he/she has detected a serious error in the pricing up of a 'minor' event; whether that be racing or sport.

About 15 years ago Tellytrack started limited broadcasting of UK racing. Depsite the fact that I knew nothing about UK racing I quickly intuited that it appeared to be, on average, of a better quality. Everything from the variety of racecourses, the manner in which they run their races (usually at breakneck speed), the quality of the bloodstock & the accuracy of their betting markets made it more appealing.

One might of thought that the operator would have quickly embraced this wagering opportunity as the cost of 'putting on the show' must surely be a fraction of the cost of staging a local meeting.

Instead they churlishly feed interested punters the bare minimum on Tellytrack. Last week's Aintree Festival was yet another example : Instead of giving us a full week of previews, discussions, speculation et al., they magnanimously gave us a 'half screen' on most of the races whilst the 'presenter' blabbered on about local dividends and viewers were treated to endless shots of local horses meandering down to the start.

Does anyone find these useful? (I have NO PROBLEM with RSA racing been prioritised but it is rather like tuning in to an international sporting event and being forced to watch a minor league event on half of the screen).

The really big UK meetings probably average out at about 1-2 per month over a year. Many of them conveniently take place during midweek when SA racing is (to put it politely) dire. Yet we are assumed to be die hard slaves of MR 64 handicaps rather than a Grade 1 from, say, Goodwood.

I am sure the operator would retort by pointing to SA attracting bigger turnovers. Well - international turnovers would probably be a lot bigger but for the following :

Little or no meaningful analysis of international racing.
Paucity of exotic bets (eg Why no Pick 6's ) on the big meetings
Interrupted (or strangled) visuals for often spurious reasons
Habitual screening of comparatively less popular centres ( eg France) instead of the vastly more popular UK offerings
Bizarre delays on international streaming
Interruptions & comment from studio presenters (who only advertise their abysmal ignorance of the events they insist in commenting on) when really helpful comment is often available from the source broadcast

Er......but why am I bothering to write this? I have reduced my horse betting by about 90% so the operator can congratulate itself on 'Mission Accomplished'.

I would much rather watch Kimberley than Parx.


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There are too many horses racing, and the weaker majority make up the bulk of the triangle. I seem to think someone in the past did have the official breakdown (of say) maidens to MR 80 level. Like most, I agree you have to be very selective when punting on meetings, especially the mid-week meetings where the card mainly caters for maiden and lower rated horses. Having said that, the centre having their "season" does have some higher rated races in their mid-week meetings, just as a punter, one never knows who is prepping, and who is having a tilt.

And the industry expect owners to fork out an average of 350k for an untested yearling..that ain't gonna happen, as someone said on another post that racing will eventually be between one stud farm and another in this country of those that are able to survive, I watched a race yesterday in the UK first timers big field, cost of horseflesh was over R100m and they were racing for a pot of R140k in our money terms..absolutley ridiculous whichever way you look at it.