Always back the horse named self-interest, son. It'll be the only one trying
Prominent harness racing trainer Nigel McGrath granted ‘partial return’ to industry after cheating ban Story by Sam Sherwood, Radio New Zealand; 16 June 2025 At the last Harness Racing New Zealand AGM a rule change was passed allowing any banned party to apply for an exemption if they have served at least half of their […]
The two men you see in the picture are the at the time CEO of Harness Racing New Zealand Brad Steele (BS) on the left in the bomber jacket, and Nigel McGrath, the disqualified serial drug cheat that the HRNZ board under Steele’s leadership changed the rules to allow to participate in the sport despite […]
With just under 3 months of the season left to go the Australian metropolitan jockeys premiership has already become a two horse race. J-Mac v Willie. Two brilliant hoops both riding winners at the extraordinary strike rate of 24.2%. At this stage McDonald leads by 103- 96 1/2, with daylight back to young gun Zac […]
The HRV integrity team descended upon last night’s Shepparton trot meeting in hordes. Every single runner on the card was pre-race swabbed by taking either or a blood or urine sample. All 87 of them. That’s extraordinary, a veritable ballroom blitz. We don’t why HRV targeted this particular meeting for a mass swabbing exercise. But […]
A New Force in QLD Greyhound Racing? Is it true that Australia’s biggest greyhound owner has paid 3 million plus to purchased a dog training property in Queensland not far from the Q? And is the owner really bringing one of New Zealand’s best trainers over to prepare his dogs from the property? Rats in […]
We are saddened to hear of the passing of Susan Branch, a stalwart of harness racing in the Waikato. On behalf of all our readers we pass our deep condolences to Susan’s loved ones, including her son Dave the architect of the wonderfully successful slot races The Race and The Trot, and her husband Murray. […]
“Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” – Winston Churchill In a golden age of New Zealand harness racing, when a new breed of Kiwi horses are having huge success on the track, the sport should be standing […]
The Ipswich racecourse has been deluged with rain in the 24 hours up to yesterday, copping a downfall of 55m of water that has rendered the track as of 5.30pm yesterday a Heavy 10. Being built on a flood plain next to a river Ipswich doesn’t drain real fast. Racing QLD knowing this has postponed […]
The Q tracks were supposed to be the safest in the Southern Hemisphere, the panacea to cure all ills in greyhound racing. Sadly they have turned out to be anything but. More dogs are getting hurt and/or dying at the custom designed ‘safe’ circuits than were ever injured at Albion Park or Ipswich or any […]
While the absence of the champion Keayang Zahara and the no-show of any Kiwis takes a slight gloss off this year’s ID26 series in some people’s eyes, for mine it throws the race wide open and makes it an ultra competitive series with all the rest of the top liners other than Jilliby Ballerini heading […]
