There’s a lot in this runaway bookie story: the regrettable reality that mostly only the naïve got stung; the utter predictability of the media coverage; the rush to blame. But perhaps the most depressing aspect to how Ger “Dixie” Dalton took a powder from Listowel owing thirty grand is that he could have showed up at the Curragh yesterday, stood on his box and shouted the odds as per usual. (more…)

Sometimes you despair of this country. Only here could the State mortgage our future to save the backsides of the greedy, inept and corrupt while at the same time slashing something intrinsically positive, productive and proven like RACE’s trainee jockey course. What’s next? EU subsidies for bank owned puppy farms? (more…)

Only racing is cockeyed enough to base so much of its product on a system that discourages effort and achievement in favour of sly mediocrity. But just as drugs were once described as a bet with your mind, betting on handicaps hasn’t a whole lot to do with sense either. The difference is you might have some chance of making dope pay. (more…)

The famous American oil-rig fire-fighter Red Adair’s standard response to queries about his prices was: “If you think it is expensive to have a professional do the job, wait until you use an amateur.” So what then might the long term cost be of having Ireland’s multi-million euro racing industry mostly policed by amateurs? (more…)