Back To The Future

Time was when this part of the world smugly dismissed day to day racing in the US, France and elsewhere as soulless betting fodder, characterising it as an unseemly rush to the bottom with programmes full of bad horses run in front of paltry crowds that might as well be playing the slots. Such complacency already looks misplaced. Times to come could see it seem even more so.

It might be coincidental that calls by trainers and owners for more meetings and more races tend to come at this time of year when the turf season on the flat is winding down and the focus turns more to Dundalk's all-weather. But it surely isn't coincidental that as the economy is supposedly thriving again the knotty question of balloting rears its head in relation to low grade flat handicaps.

It's been estimated that about 75 per cent of the country's rated racehorses are on a mark of 65 or under. Inevitably they are mostly owned by small scale owners and syndicates. They're the backbone of the industry when it comes to most training operations and indeed in relation to the thousands of jobs within racing. After all it takes as many people to look after an ordinary horse as a superstar.

It's hardly an unreasonable ask for that investment to be rewarded with opportunity. But instead there's widespread frustration with a lack of races that these horses can get into. So the solution looks straightforward - more races. Horse Racing Ireland's plans to have a second all-weather track in place by 2021, plans which may get clarified after its next board meeting, with Tipperary odds-on, suggests that's the trend.

It presents a prospect of two all-weathers racing all year round, catering for large sections of the flat population with huge programmes of ordinary handicaps run in front of nobody but lucratively streamed around the world to online punters filling in time between throws of virtual roulette. It sounds kind of familiar.

The official HRI line on maintaining standards in terms of the quality of horse running might be a casualty. So might its ideas about minimum prizemoney levels. But HRI is basically a composite of different industry parts. Policy can change in response to agendas, just as a system that gives tracks more fixtures - and thus more media rights revenue - could be amended to see those racecourses contribute more to purses.

It's a logical solution to a lack of opportunity. It may even encourage more ownership. It's opportunity rather than prizemoney that owners want. Trainers want owners. Tracks want telly money. And bookies want to give it to them in return for more and more product to serve up to addled punters to bet on from the comfort of home.

Logically it opens up a vista that is in many ways an acknowledgement of reality. Most meetings are just a TV and betting medium anyway. Financially tracks are mostly just windy studios. There's no reason either why Ireland shouldn't ape the US and Australia by staging marathon 12 races on a card and exploit it properly. In industry-terms it's a no-brainer.

However it would also be a blow to this fuzzy idea of Irish racing's distinctive soul that's tough to precisely define but which I'm pretty sure revolves around people being prepared to actually go racing as sporting spectators. A massive diet of bad racing might suit everyone involved but it hardly serves ambitions for the sport to appeal to the wider public.

Such considerations might seem superfluous to those at the coalface. They might argue that that ship has long since sailed already, and they might be right. It does however make sneering at the likes of Southwell, Finger Lakes or Enghein, in all their deserted obscurity, an indulgent luxury best consigned to the past.

On the old basis of the old Lenin about everything being connected to everything else it can be argued there's a link between all of this to production rates of thoroughbreds which in turn leads to the thorny welfare question of what to do when those animals are no longer wanted for, or are up to doing, the job they were bred for.

It's a subject bound up in the story that has throw up another nightmare scenario for Australian racing after a television investigation revealed inhumane treatment of retired racehorses. A widely seen show reported widespread slaughter of racehorses for pet food but also showed animals being beaten and shocked with electric prods at an abattoir.

For impact it may be comparable to RTE's recent programme on the greyhound industry here. It certainly highlights how vital the welfare element is in animal sports. Coming on the back of the Darren Weir animal cruelty scandal, and broadcast on the eve of a showpiece event like The Everest, it represented another blow to Australian racing's image.

Given that Australia is often regarded as a model in terms of public interest and participation, the lessons for this part of the world are obvious. Maintaining public trust that the sport isn't cruel should be racing's greatest investment. Loss of trust can turn into a very slippery slope very quickly even if it's in response to the misbehaviour of a tiny minority.

If racing has real confidence in its welfare procedures then it should be able to stand over them in the face of scrutiny. There are all manner of schemes in relation to accounting for retired thoroughbreds. But weight of numbers mean such routes are not possible for every animal and there's no point shirking from the reality that properly and humanely euthanizing thoroughbreds can be a legitimate step sometimes.

The alternative consequences of neglect that happen through ignorance, and, yes, sometimes cruelty, have also been highlighted here in recent times. The public response to such cases is often visceral because horses produce such a reaction. There's a sentiment involved that we will recognise. But emotion is optional. A professional duty of care isn't. Making sure it's carried out is always of paramount importance for the sport's own long-term future.

On the racing front British Champions Day once more fell victim to its date on the calendar. A lot of plamas got invested in bigging up Saturday's action as the best taking on the best. In reality, for a variety of reasons, including ground conditions, it conspicuously lacked a real headline equine star while Ryan Moore's absence in Australia pretty much summed up Coolmore's priorities.

The entirely admirable Magical wound up the headline act with Aidan O'Brien's first ever Champion Stakes win. But it's always hard to mention Magical without referencing her old rival, the absent Enable.

Perhaps time will ultimately recall the 2019 Champions Day primarily in terms of Oisin Murphy's first jockeys championship. It's a fine achievement by the impressive Kerryman, just the fifth Irishman ever to land the British jockeys title after Richard Hughes, Jamie Spencer, Kieren Fallon and the legendary Pat Eddery.

The latter was just 22 when winning the first of his 11 championships in 1974. Those were days when it seemed to count for more than it does now. Murphy is just two years older and has commented that he fancies the idea of hanging on to the crown for a while. The curtailed and convoluted parameters of what constitutes the British season will help him, as of course will blazing talent.

Finally, a sad reminder of how ultimately this is always a game of flesh and blood came in New Jersey on Saturday when the wonderfully versatile Wicklow Brave had a fatal fall. He had a Grade One at his mercy only to fall at the last. Victory would have given him top-flight victories over fences to go with a Grade One over hurdles and the Group One Irish Leger in 2016.

His trainer Willie Mullins once described his training regime as Wicklow Brave doing what Wicklow Brave wanted to do. A 59 race career illustrated how the ten year old wanted to race. And three out of three steeplechases prior to going to the US illustrated a horse that wanted to jump fences.