Always back the horse named self-interest, son. It'll be the only one trying
A reader has written in to ask: You don’t think the future track uncertainty had anything to do with the results? The last announced position from government was Albion Park shut March 2025, and Norwell is not scheduled to open until Oct 2026 (if it does at all). This has probably had a pronounced effect […]
Today’s APG sale was a disaster on every front. The clearance rate – the number of lots sold – was down from almost 70% last year to just over 50%, meaning that almost half of the yearlings that went under the hammer didn’t sell. The average sale price of the ones that did sell was […]
Surprisingly Burwood Stud haven’t brought a whole lot of quality to the sale, with its 6 lots being predominantly by bargain basement sires. I can’t get enthused about any of them, just as none of Cobbitty Equine Farm’s draft excites me very much. The Vagg family’s drafts often feature foals by bargain basement sires and […]
The APG Gold Coast yearling sale is on again this weekend, with 80 odd lots on offer for eager buyers willing to chase the much less attractive than before reduced $100 000 prizemoney in a sales race series for each sex limited to 2-year-olds, as opposed to the riches on offer for both 2 and […]
Everyone’s favourite bankrupt convicted water thief during a drought Dean Baring, formerly a senior executive of the harness auction company Australian Pacing Gold, has seemingly branched out into the thoroughbred yearling world. Traxion Management Services, a company formerly co-directed by Baring and now directed by his wife because bankrupts can’t be company directors, is selling […]
The APG is back! And still absolutely slack. The mob who unsuccessfully attempted to sue me a year ago for telling the truth are having one last crack. It reminds me of the last gasp of a drowning man. They’ve launched it with a new e-magazine that looks like it’s been designed by a kid. […]
There is a huge holler and hoopla about yesterday’s Nutrien announcement of a $1.25 million race night at Melton on the 13th of April next year, but what does it all actually mean? What are the prize purses for each race? Nutrien had already promised national series races worth a minimum of $975 000. Is the […]
Two Bob Rob – Robert Marshall, the former Latin master at the posh eastern suburbs Sydney school Kambala that my cousins attended while he was there, turned Chairman of Menangle and the APG – recently issued this press release claiming that APG had a new management team, one that by reasonable inference didn’t include the […]
There is a rumor floating around that says that everyone’s favorite water thief and fallen star witness in spurious court cases brought against me, Mr Dean Baring, has been ejected from the APG jet plane without a parachute. This scandalous gossip has it that the APG have finally woken up in the morning and noticed […]
The APG 2YO finals are worth $500 000 each, but it doesn’t all go to the owners. For reasons totally beyond my understanding, $100 000 of the half million goes in $10 000 lots to the breeders of the horses that start in the races . Now in my view this is just plain stupid, […]
