Plenty to ponder as harness racing changes pace

Now Wilson’s business wasn’t harness racing – he specialised in motor cars – yet this, in itself, provides a segue of sorts.

Standardbreds, you see, have become much more like motor cars over the past two decades.

Once revered for their strength, stamina and durability, pacers – and particularly trotters – have undergone a rapid revolution in recent years.

These days, speed is sacrosanct, and this evolution provides both opportunities and dilemmas.

Last weekend, feature contests were staged in Victoria from Friday through Sunday inclusive, while Tabcorp Park Menangle also hosted Group 1 racing in New South Wales on Saturday night.

Those that are relatively new to harness racing would have been desensitized to track records falling on a weekly basis and horses recording quarters and halves – 400m and 800m splits – which would have been considered crazy when this century began.

Others, however, they that have followed the sport for decades, fully understand the way the trots have changed.

On Friday night at Swan Hill, Our Millionaire (Million Dollar Cam) smashed the course benchmark in winning the Swan Hill Cup.

Two days later, Cravache Dor (Orlando Vici) did a similar job on the Maryborough 2690m standard when claiming the Victoria Trotters Derby Final.

On the one hand, the pace explosion which harness racing has rendered warrants absolute admiration.

On another, it’s redefined the sport’s identity faster than many can cope with or handle.

Without doubt, decisions must be made – and they won’t be easy.

Decisions around programming, around race distances, around race conditions; ultimately, we need solutions which prevent top-end domination and managing the import of barrier draws.

Alternatively, harness racing must also revel in its advances.

The predictable compression between horse talent around the world offers an incredible chance to globalise the game faster than many would have expected, and, as we’ve seen in thoroughbred racing, globalisation is crucial.

Improving, at anything, must be celebrated and change must always be embraced.

Embracing it the right way, however, will determine just what price harness racing pays for its astonishing progress.

Jason Grimson is currently occupying rarefied air.

Last December, he won the Inter Dominion Grand Final with a talented, but far from elite pacer named Boncel Benjamin.

During the Queensland winter carnival, he won the Blacks A Fake with a talented, but far from elite pacer named Majestic Cruiser.

And, on Saturday night, he claimed the Group 1 Len Smith Mile with a talented, but far from elite pacer named I Cast No Shadow.

Nobody, anywhere, has made good horses great the way Grimson has in recent years.

Whether he can keep producing miracles now becomes the question.

by Jason Bonnington, for HRV