An update from the President

24 January 2025

Mr Matt Isaacs, CEO
Harness Racing Victoria

Re: FY26 Race Calendar Guiding Principles & Concessions for 2yos and 3yos

Thank-you for the opportunity to provide feedback on the FY26 Race Calendar Guiding Principles. This is a joint submission from the Victorian Harness Racing Club (VHRC) representing owners, Harness Breeders Victoria (HBV), Trots Clubs Victoria (TCV) and the Victorian Square Trotters Association (VSTA). The Victorian Trainers and Drivers Association have advised that they will be submitting their own separate submission.

In essence we agree with five of the seven guiding principles. The principles that we agree with are as follows:

1. Wagering turnover is the primary focus to drive industry income.
2. SKY Racing 1 availability is a priority (linked to 1 above).
3. Regional split is based on horse population and participant needs.
4. Exploration of vacant timeslots to maintain HRV wagering share for POCT returns
5. Maintain existing feature race dates and community alignments.

The principles that we do not agree with are:

4. Detailed regional allocation for meeting rotation.
5. Regional racing slots

We offer the following comments in relation to guiding principles 4 and 5 which we do not entirely agree with.

• HRV’s priority should be to produce evenly graded fields with full field sizes that produces competitive racing in the highest turnover SKY 1 slots as often as possible in the Calendar. This should be the overarching guiding principle. If this is achieved, it will drive wagering turnover. Consistency of venue or region in some respects compromises this objective.

• The concept of venue or regional consistency does not of itself produce evenly graded fields with full field sizes as often as possible. The current and proposed rotations in many respects work against this principle. Currently and under the proposed rotation we see Maryborough or Charlton racing on a Wednesday Day and Bendigo racing on a Wednesday Night. It is logistically difficult for trainers to race at both meetings forcing trainers to choose one meeting over the other. As there are not always suitable races on every program for every horse, this forces trainers in this region to race their horses in unsuitable races (doesn’t help wagering turnover), to leave some of their horses at home (doesn’t help field sizes) or to have to travel further to other meetings to find suitable races. Splitting the Central meetings across different days would help trainers better place their horses and help boost average field sizes and provide more evenly graded races which in turn helps boost turnover.

• Consistency of venue in the FY25 calendar we believe will have reduced the average number of starts for a horse per year which has not helped field sizes. Under the previous calendar, horses in the Murray Valley region for example would have raced at say Shepparton on a Thursday Night, backed up at Echuca the following Wednesday Night and then raced at Cobram the following Monday. That equates to 3 starts in 11 days. Under the FY25 calendar these horses unless they travelled further to other regions will race at Shepparton on a Tuesday night and will only have 3 starts in 14 days. When multiplied over the entire racing population and for 365 days per year, we believe this is one of the reasons why field sizes and the number of small horse fields that we have now is much higher than previously.

• There is no consistency of venue or region in Victorian or NSW Thoroughbreds and yet these jurisdictions have the highest wagering share of any code in Australia. Punters would have no idea where a Thoroughbred race meeting in Victoria or NSW is going to be on any given Thursday yet it does not stop them betting on these meetings.

• Similarly in Victorian Harness we have an abundance of good quality Harness Tracks that conduct most of our meetings and we should be encouraging punters no matter what day or night of the week it is to wager on our product because it is good quality, evenly graded with high field sizes that produce good competitive racing.

• There is significant overlap between the regions eg a trainer in Kilmore is central to a number of tracks including Kilmore, Melton, Bendigo, Cranbourne, Yarra Valley, Shepparton, Geelong etc. These venues are split into four regions under HRV’s regional split.

• Whilst travel for participants is a factor, we believe that it is being overplayed by HRV and leading to misguided calendar decisions. We believe that most owners and trainers would rather travel an extra hour to race their horse in a suitable race where they believe that they can be highly competitive with a good chance of winning or earning rather than racing at their home track where they have little chance and are making up the numbers. Owners and trainers (within reasonable travel parameters) are generally motivated to race where they believe they have the best chance of earning as opposed to racing at their closest venue.

In relation to the proposed racing schedule in FY26 we offer the following comments and feedback:

• We do not believe that two Central venues racing on a Wednesday is conducive to maximizing field sizes and wagering turnover. If a regional model is to be utilized then Central venues should not be racing on the same day.

• Similarly, we do not believe that two Western venues should be racing on the same day on Mondays as it seems is proposed under the FY26 calendar. All we would be doing under this scenario is splitting the horse population in the region and likely leading to smaller field sizes at both meetings.

• Having North and Inner West venues racing on consecutive nights and Shepparton and Bendigo likewise is probably not contributing to maximum field sizes and best use of the horse population. Providing a better spread within the week of these meetings would be more likely to produce better and higher average field sizes.

• We hope that HRV are not considering conducting Cranbourne meetings on 52 Sunday Nights as the proposed rotation implies. Cranbourne has consistently produced small field sizes and seems over represented in the existing FY25 calendar.

• We cannot understand why Bendigo - a premier and central venue to the entire State which draws horses from all regions would be racing during the day in the Summer months. Bendigo needs to be retained for night racing all year round and venues like Geelong, Melton and Kilmore should conduct more day meetings in Summer to allow Mildura to race at night. There are good reasons to consider Bendigo racing on a Friday Night given their central location and the absence of traffic issues for certain trainers that are encountered on a Friday night for Geelong and Melton meetings.

Whilst we do not necessarily believe that consistency of venue and region will produce our overarching objective, given that HRV seem intent on the consistency theme, we put forward the following two alternatives which we believe will provide the consistency element but more flexibility and which we believe will work better from a horse population and field sizes point of view.

Alternative 1

Day Night
Monday Various Various
Tuesday Kilmore / Geelong / Melton
Wednesday Various Goulburn Valley
Thursday Kilmore / Geelong / Melton
Friday Mallee Ballarat / Bendigo
Saturday Metro
Sunday Country Cups Eastern / Various

Alternative 2

Day Night
Monday Various Various
Tuesday North & Inner West
Wednesday Various Goulburn Valley
Thursday North & Inner West
Friday Mallee Central
Saturday Metro
Sunday Country Cups Eastern / Various

In our view the above alternatives make better use of our premier regional venues in Bendigo and Ballarat that are central to major racing populations. They split up the Central meetings and provides a better gap between Shepparton and Bendigo as well as the North and Inner West venues. It also provides an element of flexibility which is essential in the calendar whilst having a consistency element that HRV seem determined to retain.

We would strongly encourage HRV to formulate a small working party consisting of knowledgeable Industry representatives in this space to work with and help guide HRV in the formulation of the FY26 racing calendar that will produce evenly graded fields with maximum field sizes that produce competitive racing and maximises wagering turnover. We suggest that some of the shortfalls with the current FY25 calendar eg Warragul racing the day after Cranbourne would have been avoided if a small working party was engaged to assist and guide HRV.

Concessions for 2yos and 3yos

As previously outlined, our Associations and the greater Industry is supportive of concessions for 2yos and 3yos in the National Ratings System. It is our view that there should be some consistency with existing Mares/Fillies Concessions (5 points) and Concession Drivers concessions (starting at 5 points). It is our recommendation that the 3yo concession should be 5 points and the 2yo concession should be 10 points.

Thanks again for being asked to provide feedback on these topics. We would be more than happy to speak to or outline our points in further detail.

Yours sincerely,

Emmy Mazzetti Paul Rowse

President – Victorian Harness Racing Club President – Trots Clubs Victoria

Anne-Maree Conroy

President – Vic Square Trotters Association

John Coffey

President – Harness Breeders Victoria