The desecration of Royal Randwick, with the world champion James McDonald again out to buck the tax applied to him, and insider trading take the spotlight.
Only one early favourite, Scripted in The Agency, on Friday assessments for his 10 mounts at headquarters on Saturday, hardly adheres to the imposition.
Wise guys reckon he necessitates a levy: engagements being shorter odds by comparison with other jockeys because of his expertise.
Five Rosehill winners last Saturday make him a major feature this week on the hallowed Randwick turf, under threat of high-rise apartment blocks, promoted as a means to ease Sydney’s housing shortage.
Three thousand apartments on the southern end are mooted for the scheme which would net the cash poor Australian Turf Club millions, poverty stricken because of unfair racing turnover distribution. Racing NSW get gold, the ATC shrapnel.
At the last Randwick meeting a water leak on a fine day dripped poverty into a bucket in a member’s stand bar, once a thriving entertainment centre, alongside the old pressroom.
Following the debacle over the proposed sale of Rosehill Gardens, the Randwick offer will be put to members. It is regarded as a “very small parcel of land”, but obviously a sizeable building project at a major racehorse training centre.
Still the powers-that-be, insider traders perhaps, are not going off half-cocked as they did with Rosehill.
Meanwhile Peter Mair, once the punters’ representative on Racing NSW, is on the bleat again. Strength to his bow although I rarely agree with him.
“Tell me when, how often, if ever these steward’s inquiries even suggest, let alone find, evidence of ‘insider trading’,” he emailed.
“………….. evidence that insider-trading, bets placed, was ‘not reasonably doubted’.
“It is odds-on that, if you, or many others, were given the brief to find the evidence — a faithful report of malfeasance could be routinely tendered about a stewards’ panel itself unable to ever find ‘anything untoward’.
“How about CCTV evidence of ‘big bets’ placed with cash, collected with cash, at TAB agencies.”
Successful insider trading in racing?
The Debtors’ Wing at Long Bay has been over-crowded, peopled by those getting the whispered word, the stable oil and jockey’s tips.
Yes, there was a time when trainers had to survive on pelf from bookmakers, backing winners and layers losers, but that also fraught with pitfalls.
For instance Jack Green, one of the most astute, confided in vet Perce Sykes that he had three runners in a race, rare at the time, but two were fed with bran mash, the equivalent of a marathon runner consuming meat pies before an event.
“Be careful Jack,” Sykes warned. The vet advised bran mash was good for horses with stomach ulcers where it could be beneficial. One with bran mash scored.
The punter with a fetish for leather, not Aitken, had top mail from trainers and jockeys as well as the phone tappers, the mob that tuned into personal telephone conversations of everyone that mattered. He slung well paying for services rendered.
Alas, in frustration with debts accrued, he despatched himself with a grenade, leaving not even a shred of animal hide.
Follow the money has always been a guide but like most can backfire. Consider J-Mac last Saturday: Confederation was $10 on Friday, opened at $5.5, firmed to $3.40, and was beaten by stablemate Hidrix ($13), also prepared by Chris Waller.
Another notable J-Mac drifter Sixties, also prepared by Waller, eased from $3.00 to $4.20 before bolting away with the Precise Air.
Sure the champ had an influence with Willaidow in the JRA Plate backed from $6.50 to $4.60 and required all the assistance he could give him, scoring in the last couple of strides.
Most of his rides on Saturday will require considerable aid.
On face value his early favourite Scripted, tuned by Matt Dunn, is paying the J-Mac tax, being beaten at his last four in Queensland but Best Bets reported at his previous three defeats: “had no favours”, “no favours” and “very good”.
Possibly Fireball, a strong J-Mac chance in the Inglis Millenium, won his only attempt at Rosehill on November 29 but the form behind him wasn’t flash.
Also the Snitzel colt was pushed out, hardly cuddled like most of Waller’s youngsters, in a recent barrier trial. Wodeton, a three-year-old, comes into the camouflage category.
With J-Mac aboard, Wodeton takes on the program’s hottest favourite, Tempted ($1.70), in the Eskimo Prince.
Odds-on chances did not have a good run last Saturday at Randwick: Incognito ($1.95) went down to Waller’s Confederation and Cross Tasman ($1.50) was the victim of a J-Mac pearl on Pippie Beach.
Last campaign Wodeton kicked off a Waller whooper but ended a wimp. Still the colt has ability. Beware.
J-Mac takes over on West Of Africa (Inglis Digital), desperately in need of navigational guidance, lacked in three starts this campaign while Nervous Witness, to end his day, is a query in the Spelling A Coolmore.
An eight-year-old gelding Nervous Witness is difficult to assess. Recent efforts indicate a Hong Kong “burnout”.
However Nervous Witness went very fast in recent Caulfield barrier trial but will require plenty of help. That’s not insider trading just the gamble.
And the 3,000 apartments at Randwick racecourse? More a developer’s dream than housing for the needy.
The Bandits and the Smokeys
The word ‘allegedly’, now often preceding inferences of mal-intent, is missing in historical accounts — to wit, perhaps, the record of a Jack-Green confession might best be rephrased — that ‘one ‘allegedly’ with bran mash scored’.
The Banjo was astutely ‘on the money’ advising beneficiaries of allegedly inside-information, to watch where the money actually went on.
Alas, smart money is likely to be ‘on’ well before a market-mover is identified — punters with a reputation for being ‘smart’ are unlikely to be getting set late with a corporate bookie anyway.
It is also not easy to see well-informed ‘cash’ going on, and taken away, at tote agencies.
What would be interesting is steward’s hearing explanations from ‘unexpectedly’ winning tote-punters about their exceptional — on CCTV — no longer allegedly, ability to assess the form.