Paul Kent: Racing Victoria’s gripe with Peter V’landys and Racing NSW over The Everest
It’s a battle of power and ego. In a bid to restore their version of order to the breeding industry, Racing Victoria continues to turn a cold shoulder to Peter V’landys, Racing NSW and The Everest, writes PAUL KENT.
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For some time those men at Racing Victoria, high on Olympus, sneered down their well manicured noses at what this Peter V’landys guy was doing in NSW.
He didn’t fit the type.
He was not private school educated and his suits were off the rack and, well, his nose had been in a scrum or two.
And somewhere in there this Everest race V’landys had invented was upsetting the natural order of racing.
Through their own kindness, they believed, Sydney was given the Autumn Carnival and when the time for the big show came, the Spring Carnival, the whole caravan and all the money it generated moved to Melbourne, as it should be.
The jolly fellows of Racing Victoria chortled into their vintage cognac at this little ruse.
Then about seven years ago V’landys said enough was enough.
What has transpired is something most of us find amusing, the only pity being they don’t sell tickets for it; old rich guys fighting.
As a spectacle goes, it’s kind of like watching the kindergarten sandpit, but it is fun all the same.
The fight has gathered momentum in recent times when NSW’s breeding industry got involved, complaining about a lack of respect, or somesuch, and for reasons no one quite understands the breeders have also picked a fight with Racing NSW.
And, as rich folk tend to do, they couldn’t take up a fight on their own, so they sided with Racing Victoria in a bid to go after V’landys.
The target is The Everest.
They want its head on a spear.
The backroom manoeuvring has gone up in recent weeks as Racing NSW readied for The Championships, which begin at Royal Randwick today, and Racing Victoria and a group of powerful owners try to raise the heat on V’landys and Racing NSW.
The Everest is not a Group One race.
Racing Victoria refuses to consider it, despite the reality it is Australia’s richest race and all of the country’s best sprinters are in the race.
Such is the animosity between States for several years they have not even met to even broach it.
Racing Victoria’s public sentiment is that the race is a made up race and has no place on the racing calendar.
That it fails to follow the natural order of racing, which is that horses progress from Group Three to Group Two to the grand final, the Group One later in the calendar.
Yet Racing Victoria has destroyed its own argument to this only recently. It brought forward the Group One Australian Cup (2000m) to run just a fortnight after the All Star Mile (16000m) last weekend. Group Twos and Threes are to follow.
The All Star Mile, by the way, was introduced just a few years back as an attempted counter to The Everest.
Racing Victoria’s true beef is that The Everest has taken its prestige and, most of all, its wagering money away from its own state, money that it normally counted on through the Spring Carnival.
Around the growth of The Everest in NSW, prizemoney went up and field sizes increased because trainers saw the value of staying in Sydney and pursuing what the entire racing industry is built for, which is making money.
Racing NSW revenue increased by 80 per cent over the year because of the halo effect The Everest caused, for instance.
That was money Racing Victoria no longer saw.
Finally, and perhaps ultimately, The Everest is winning the public battle for the delicate little hearts and minds of our young who couldn’t tell a racehorse from a plough horse but know the place to be is at Randwick in the Spring.
The owners and breeders started getting upset with The Everest because horses like Redzel, who won The Everest twice, retired with prize money of $16 million to be behind only Winx in Australian stakes earnings. Worst of all, though, he was a gelding.
Sadly, mostly for Redzel, all his potential stud earnings were left on a vet’s operating table some years before, so they couldn’t make a dollar off him at stud.
In fact, of the seven Everest winners so far, six are geldings, so the race was causing turmoil in the breeding industry.
So, as happens in love and war, where the enemy of my enemy is my friend, Racing Victoria and the owners and breeders have joined forces to go after V’landys and Racing NSW to kill off The Everest.
Why, is somewhat confusing.
Given prize money has gone up, the price of racehorses has got more expensive.
Because the sales prices are higher, stud fees have gone up.
The owners and breeders have never had it better.
This, at a time trainers still work 14 hour days seven days a week for just enough to put soup on the table and while jockeys, while well paid, put their lives on the line every time they climb into the saddle.
The breeders don’t so much as break a nail.
Just this weekend, the Inglis Easter Yearling Sales begin Sunday and end Monday and it is widely expected the sales will break the record for most million dollar sales, set in 2008 just before the global financial crisis, at 28.
This is a result of the massive boost of money in racing in recent years.
Racing NSW’s return to owners and participants, for another, increased from $227 million to $410 million in the seven years The Everest has existed and yet the breeders are still complaining.
Trainers and jockeys are registered and subjected to Australia’s racing laws but the breeders are not. They want a say in how the business is run but don’t want to be registered as it would make them answerable to Racing NSW for how they operate.
The breeders take from the industry but give little back.
Maybe there should be a stallion tax.
In their background bid to oust V’landys and restore order to the breeding industry, which is counter intuitive given the money they are now making, but speaks to their stubborn arrogance, they have adopted the modern form of guerrilla warfare, which is social media and misinformation.
What it is truly about is what it is almost always truly about when it comes to old men fighting, without a scar on their knuckles but with all the money to send in the troops, which is about power and ego.
And the battle ground is The Everest.
Meanwhile, the lifeblood of the industry, the punters, turn up and pay $35 for general admission for the privilege of doing their dough with the bookies.
Rich men don’t care about that.
…
Bobby Lanigan was one of those big hearted guys who was always most comfortable ensuring others succeeded.
Lanigan, an old toe-poker, was the competition’s highest pointscorer in 1966 when Newtown climbed from the canvas, as the Bluebags were known to do, and finished fourth to make the finals.
He played five years for Newtown before going on to become a trainer with Parramatta, Wigan, the Warriors and the New Zealand Kiwis.
Years back, Lanigan Parramatta coach John Monie and reserve grade coach Peter Louis would wait for him and fullback Paul Taylor at the Kariong service station to share the drive to Parramatta Stadium for training.
He was unusually late.
Realising they would be late for training the coaches headed off and left behind a messenger to tell Lanigan to get there as fast as possible. Coaches rarely looked kindly on tardiness.
Ten minutes later Lanigan roared into the carpark with Taylor sprawled asleep on the back seat.
Seems Taylor had over celebrated his son’s birth and Lanigan had to break into his house when he spotted Taylor passed out inside his home, causing him to be late.
Taylor slept the whole way.
Lanigan tried to take the fall on Taylor’s behalf but Monie could smell Taylor from the next dressing room and knew what had happened.
He played 67 games for Newtown and was everything rugby league tried to be.
He died Thursday, at 81, after a long illness he fought to the end. Many owe him a debt.
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