Nomination – Acceptance
These are two words that are part of every day life for a Kiwi harness racing trainer. Initially they ‘nominate’ a horse for a race that it is eligible for, then, when the list of nominations are posted on the website, they consider whether to ‘accept’ or withdraw the horse for that race, for whatever reason.
However, the above decision should be made on all the relevant facts and conditions being available which, in some instances recently, is not the case. This Sunday for instance, there were two standing start races programmed for horses rated R35 to R55 with discretionary handicaps to be decided after entries are closed. The previous week, there was a special handicap for similar rated horses with R35-39 off the front and higher assessed horses off handicaps. Logic would suggest that the same thing might apply this week. However, under the race title trainers were presented with the following spiel: 'For R35 to R55 pacers. These Races will be selected by either: a) 1-Win only Pacers on Ratings (lowest to highest), b) Ratings (lowest to highest), c) Conditions (this means a higher Rated 1-Win only Pacer may be included in a lower Rated Race), d) a yet to be determined method, or a combination of these methods, as determined by the Club in consultation with HRNZ.
So a trainer basically has no idea what race his or her horse is going to end up in, or how it will be handicapped, yet is forced to ‘accept’ the conditions. As it turned out option d) was the outcome for one of the races which comprised of one win horses, and because there weren’t enough of those, the R35 – R39’s thrown in for what I describe as ‘cannon fodder.’ Why? Because the week before they couldn’t get in the money with the benefit of a ten metre handicap, yet this week they are forced to race those higher graded horses off the same mark. It seems that certain officials are obsessed with reverting to the old class handicapping system when it suits them, which completely circumvents the rating system currently in force.
The problem, as is often the case, lies in the small print, in the form of a clause in the Handicapping Regulations which reads:
10. Racing Clubs will have the ability to programme races based on conditions: i.e. non-winners, winners of one race, money won, unplaced, age etc.
Those words basically mean that anyone who doesn’t like the rating system, can slot in what they want and mess up the entire official Industry structure. There is no such clause in the Australian rating Rules, so why do we have it?
Pete Cook