Boost in stakes for Southern region

The Future Starts Now roadshow was in Invercargill last night and Brad Steele the new CEO for Harness Racing New Zealand announced a number of stakes increases for the Southern Region.

The Southern Belle Speed Series Final raced over 1609 metres at Winton in April has been elevated to Group Three status and will now be worth $40,000.

Two three year old Southern Solstice races each worth $30,000, will be added to the southern racing calendar and are to be raced at Winton and Invercargill, while the David Moss Stakes which is raced in December on Invercargill Cup day will be worth $50,000 in future.

Steele also announced the Omakau Trotting FFA won last year by Smokin Bandar will be raced for $40,000 in January. a $40,000 Group Three Trotters final at Tuapeka on October 26^th   whilst the Southern Country Cups Final held on Diamonds Day, will now be raced for $40,000 – up by $15,000.

“That’s the short term strategy. With the long term we’re looking for an increase in revenue. My personal view is that when this strategy works there are two ways to spend the money. One is we need more races. The more races we’ve got the more owners we’ve got winning races. Secondly, we’ll look at broad based increases across our bread and butter races,” Steele said.

Steele and HRNZ Board Chairman Phil Holden met with the board of Southern Harness yesterday and concerns were expressed about the Invercargill Cup clashing with the Golden Gait Series in Auckland where there are already a number of $100,000 races.

In commenting on this last night Brad Steele said “When I was talking to the chairman of the ATC on Friday he explained to me that to participate in the Golden Gait Series you have to have a minimum of six race starts in Auckland. Getting feedback from the Southern team today there was more of a concern around the clash between the Invercargill Cup (22^nd December) and the Auckland Cup (31^st December). The challenge for the Invercargill Cup is to get a full field and there could be a role that we can play there. There is also a $200,000 Four Year Old race at Addington on the 10^th of December which we think will be a really good holding race for horses to stay and pop back down for the Invercargill Cup.”

The southern region also expressed concerns at the number of Thursday race days the area has been allocated as eleven of the fifteen race dates across the region in August, September and October are on a Thursday.

“We understand that the clubs are built of volunteers. The last thing we want is for those volunteers having to take an annual leave day to go to those meetings. I was talking to Dean Shannon about the possibility of having more twilight meetings (on Thursdays) and he’s very supportive of us running those if we possibly can. He’s also going away and looking at converting some of those Thursday meetings into Sundays and having two Sunday harness meetings running on a Sunday. He didn’t reject the idea and I think there’s a possibility that we could see some of those Thursday meetings perhaps shift to Sunday.”

Last night’s roadshow was well attended and plans were clearly communicated. It’s always  helpful for industry participants to be able to hear future plans in person and in their own area – a positive start to the next leg of the journey in harness racing in the south.

by Bruce Stewart, for Harnesslink