10/09/14
As a website pioneer for the racing industry and having proudly put the first race club, stud, jockey and trainer on the Internet in this country, one could mount a case as to why Justracing could one day get an induction into the racing Hall of Fame, if all things were fair dinkum and above board in the corridors of power at Racing Queensland. But it seems that that induction in racing parlance would be about 100/1 and drifting at this present time as surely step one in the process would be to simply get an invitation to the awards night, so I guess even if I did get inducted, they’d have to post the Hall of Fame document as I wouldn’t be there to accept it.
And don’t get me wrong and think it’s arrogant of me to suggest a Hall of Fame guernsey, as there’s no problem with self indulgence when it comes to Hall of Fame gigs as former Racing Queensland Chairman Bob Bentley is already in there. I think he got voted in when he was running the show. Now that sounds like a democratic way of doing things – vote yourself in. But I must say at least when Bob Bentley was running the show I used to get invited to awards nights. That regime probably were intelligent enough to conclude that it would be astute business acumen to invite the largest (numerically) racing website owner in all of Australia – and “Bob the Builder” and his merry men probably felt that they got good value for money. After all, they only had to simply supply some vomitable and allegedly upmarket food like “fresh(ly shot) quail in a creamy gherkin chutney” or some other similar food that they dish up at all these posh joints and there would be 50 or more photos of the evening put up here the next week. I mean when you attend these racing functions you don’t get a say in whether Flossie hands you the “fresh(ly shot) quail in a creamy gherkin chutney” or “salmon with mango puree”. What happens if you don’t like fish and Flossie throws a plate of salmon in front of you? You have to sit there like a goose and smile as by the time they serve the meal you are so hungry that you feel like going out the front and chasing car tyres.
But anyway I did get the Media Release through late Saturday night and had a look at the award winners and didn’t intend commenting – as if they can’t be bothered inviting me – why should I give a toss about the night?
Running my eye down the list of winners I must say that everything was going along okay until I saw where the stallion Falvelon had been admitted to the Hall of Fame. Thank God I didn’t get invited as in the unlikely event that I did get invited, we may well have gone as my besotted bride likes getting dressed up and stuff – as women do, so old codgers can ogle over her raw beauty.
Anyway back to the score at the Test and if I had gone to the awards night, I must admit that when they read that Falvelon one out, up instantly would have come the fresh(ly shot) quail in a creamy gherkin chutney. Fair dinkum, there should be a full blown “retrospective running and handling enquiry” into how Falvelon came to get into the Queensland Racing Hall of Fame.
You see that’s what the problem is with racing in this State of Queensland. We do this sort of nonsense, year-in-and-year-out, which then allows southern States to roll on the floor doing Louie The Fly impersonations at just how stupid we all are.
Don’t get me wrong here. There was certainly nothing wrong with letting Falvelon go to stand at stud upon his retirement from the racetrack, as he won 15 of his 37 starts across Australia and Hong Kong, including two Group 1 Doomben 10,000’s – firstly in 2001 and then in 2002. Trainer Dan Bougoure did a great job with him. It’s doubtful if he trains until he’s 80 that Dan will get another as good as Falvelon.
But it’s simply a fact of life that so many top class racehorses are flops at stud and Falvelon was always destined to be an ordinary sire, as he had so many starts (37). I accept that Lonhro had 35 starts and that he is a “successful sire” but 99% of heavily raced stallions are simply a waste of time at stud and Falvelon most certainly is not what I would deem a “successful stallion”. At very best he’s what the industry would call “a bread and butter sire”.
The latest stallion statistics for Falvelon are readily available in either the 2014 Stallions publication, or in the recently released Gold Coast Magic Millions 2YO’s In Training Sale catalogue – and that sale is scheduled for 30 September.
The 2014 Stallions says Falvelon has had 435 runners for 296 winners, meaning he has a 68.05% winners-to-runners ratio. To be fair, there’s nothing wrong with that 68.05% – 75% to 80% would be better, but for the purpose of the exercise let’s say 68.05% is okay. But where Falvelon falls short is that in his “435 runners” he’s only produced nine stakeswinners and those nine stakeswinners are noted as being Keiki (Group 2 winner), the Group 3 winning pair of Walking Or Dancing and Mr Profumo, along with six Listed winners, namely Someday, Gundy Son, Kryptelon, Joe Czarina, Excellantes and She’s Meaner.
So from “435 runners” Falvelon hasn’t thrown a solitary Group 1 winner. In fact he’s produced just one lousy Group 2 winner and two Group 3 winners. In any fair person’s opinion, that’s ordinary, as you wouldn’t lose any sleep through not owning any of the nine stakeswinners he’s produced – for as per those names, they’re hardly Hall of Fame candidates.
The Magic Millions 30 September catalogue says Falvelon has now had “439 runners” for “300 winners” and he still only has nine stakewinners, so that means without website readers having to spend any money to confirm these freely available latest statistics, Falvelon has 68.34% winners-to-runners (300 of 439) and he possesses a pathetic 2.05% stakeswinners-to-runners ratio (9 of 439).
Furthermore, it’s simply a fact of life in thoroughbred racing that when a stallion is “successful” his service fee goes up, due to the normal retail market “supply and demand” factors that abound in our society, yet when he went off to stud in 2003 Falvelon’s service fee was $13,750. Yet his advertised service fee in this current season is just $8,800. Had he been “successful,” his service fee today would hardly be 64% of what it was originally. As an analogy, when Fastnet Rock went off to stud in 2005 in Australia, he stood for $55,000. His advertised service fee for the 2013/2014 season in Stallions was $275,000. His service fee in the current season is advertised as “on application”. Redoute’s Choice went to stud in the Year 2000 for an advertised service fee of $35,000. His now advertised service fee in the current season is $110,000. Lonhro stood for a service fee of $66,000 in his first year at stud in 2004, but today he’s advertised service fee in the current season is $88,000 – and so on and so forth. You see, put simply, “successful” stallions stand for a higher fee during their career than they do in their first year at stud.
So what judge or judges judged this award and allowed Falvelon to enter the Hall of Fame? The public are entitled to know, but in the smoke and mirrors world of racing administration and moreover in “the incestuous world of thoroughbred racing”, naturally no one will say anything. Not one person from any of Racing Queensland, Magic Millions, Gold Coast Turf Club or the Queensland Breeders Association will even take me up on my wonderfully kind offer of an “unedited right of reply” that they’ve each been offered here for the last seven years, as to why massive rorts happen with Magic Millions prizemoney each year on their big race day at the Gold Coast in January. That automatically shows the foul smell that surrounds that race day.
If Falvelon can get admitted to the Racing Queensland Hall of Fame with a “pathetic” 2.05% stakeswinners-to-runners ratio, God alone knows what gem of a stallion based in Queensland will get a gig next year. I shudder to think.
Racing Queensland should forthwith bring in a new rule for their Awards Nights, namely “There need not be an inductee into the thoroughbred stallion Hall of Fame, just for the sake of giving some sire a gig”.
If you think Favelon’s statistics are worthy of a Hall of Fame induction, well I ask “why the hell aren’t stallions of the ilk of Just Awesome, Brave Warrior and St Covet already in there”? I put Just Awesome on the Internet for Glen Avon Lodge way back in 1996. He only had one testicle and stood for $3,300 and affable former steward turned studmaster, Fred Brown, would do deals on that figure. Sadly he only stood for two seasons at stud before his premature death and he got some of the worst mares imaginable, as stallions in that bottom end of the market habitually do.
And all these sooks that stand one or more stallions today in Queensland will tell you garbage like “ah, we don’t have enough black type races run in Queensland to allow a sire to get stakeswinners”. Garbage – it’s sure strange that after all the things that he had going against him, Just Awesome’s final statistics read that he had an amazing 84 of his 88 (95.45%) named foals race and of those 84, no fewer than 68 won a race, giving him a wonderful winners-to-runners ratio of 80.95%. From his 84 individual runners, he produced six stakeswinners, which equates to a stakeswinners-to-runners ratio of 7.14%.
For his part Brave Warrior also stood for only two seasons before his premature death for a service fee of just $5,500 and he had 101 named foals of which 84 raced. Of those 84, some 66 won a race, which represents a winners-to-runners ratio of 78.57%. Of his 84 individual runners, seven were stakeswinners, giving him a stakeswinners-to-runners ratio of 8.33%. Brave Warrior stood at the McAlpine family owned and operated Eureka Stud.
And amazingly just three days after Brave Warrior died, St Covet, a stallion standing at Glenlogan Park for a $10,000 service fee in the 1997 season, also died prematurely. St Covet stood for three seasons at stud and his progeny that represented him, achieved a terrific winners-to-runners ratio of 80.9% and a stakeswinners-to-runners ratio of 7.35%.
It is my considered opinion that Racing Queensland on the back of awarding the racing photograph of the year last year to a photo that wasn’t even taken in the correct racing season, have gone the quinella this year by stupidly inducting Falvelon into the Hall of Fame when there are three stallions that come straight to my mind that were far more deserving of the spot. And for the record, there is certainly no rule to say the stallion has to be alive to be inducted, as Lyndhurst Stud’s Smokey Eyes had been gone for decades before he was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2013. In 2012, another Glenlogan Park stallion Show A Heart got the gig even though he can’t compete statistically in the same league as any of Just Awesome, Brave Warrior and St Covet. For the record Show A Heart’s latest statistics as they appear in the 2014 Stallions are 65.56% winners to runners (396 individual winners from 604 runners) for an ordinary 3.48% stakeswinners-to-runners (21 stakeswinners from 604 runners). So his figures are pathetic when lined up with any of Just Awesome, Brave Warrior or St Covet.
Quite clearly some people on judging panels have no idea.
As far as I’m concerned, seeing that it’s racing industry money that is being expended to fund all these overpaid underachievers from Racing Queensland – and their mates – to attend these very expensive awards nights, the names of the judges need to be advised alongside the name of each category winner, except those that are obvious – like jockey and trainer premierships, etcetera.
Today on www.brisbaneracing.com.au there’s the first of two days of photos from Doomben last Saturday plus others of interest. On www.sydneyracing.com.au there’s Brian Russell’s story on the achievements of a $5,500 service fee stallion last week, whilst on www.melbourneracing.com.au Victorian racing is perused.