Hi guys

just wondering why the race wasnt split, i thought we did a poll about this?

it makes us small trainers a less of a good chance when we are half way cross a track!

yes i know theres good and bad days but i dont see why it wasnt split

cheers

I have to agree with Ryan - I called the race and I am now handicapping it. I have nine horses as non runners. I am sure a few of them were non runners in previous weeks as well.

Gray made the decision to only split races with more tha 24 runners. This race only had 24 runners. If anyone had a problem with that they should have communicated this when Gray stated what he would do rather than now after the fact

I think this issue is the main focus of concern at the moment and that some decisions for next season should be made as soon as this season ends. My concern is that everyone will do what they usually do (and to a degree have already) and that is desert the forums for 2 months and then come back a week before the season starts and this will still not have had a clear decision made.

We have 18 flat races today and for race runners and commentators that is simply too many so we can't just go willy nilly splitting races here there and everywhere.

Spme races are under subscribed. For example today there is a 5 runner 2m4f flat 0-100 that is a totally pointless race as we had the Cesarewitch over 2.2 plus another low handicap at 2.1.

The other issue is the tracks. There are plenty of tracks that can accommodate 24 runners the AW can't. I know it is nice to use as many of the tracks as possible but why on earth have we got this pre occupation with AW dirt racing on UK tracks. They are where most of the problems occur and moving huge chunks of the AW races to bigger tracks is a far simpler solution than having 42 races a week. The AW championship series for a start should be moved to turf as those races are always attracting big fields because of the prospect of a final week final to qualify for.

Or if we are so desperate for it to be AW lets ask gray to build an AW version of Newmarket

Agree Martin


Leon i dont think there is a big difference in 24 runner field than a 25 runner field! In fact its only making it worse rather than helping some of us out!

Also Leon i think you were the one that made the poll, i dont usually rant on about this but it needs to be dwelt with or its just gonna cause a problem.

Like Martin said It is too many to commentate on.

Am adding races with new courses as experiments to see the draw effect. Chepstow has come out really well and might be used to replace other courses next season where the draw is clearly a problem

The days are going to need to be 13 races per day. That would split it evenly. Ideally there would not be many races added.

Sorry the 2m4 race was a mistake in retrospect and will be removed next season.

The number of races that need to be split has come down dramatically. And this will improve further with better balancing.


Race 17 the draw seemed to not be so bad based on the top 3 finishes with draw 17 and 16 finishing 1st and 3rd. Also some horses came wide and ran ok. Clearly there is still an issue with horses not getting in around bends and may send Mark some race files as examples to see if the issue can be sorted out.

In a 24 horse race you still have a chance but it may be small of winning. However above this it is an issue. As Martin said we can't split too many races so there will be some hardluck stories but that is racing

There has to be a cut off limit somewhere and it is 24

Ok thanks leon.

The mistake this week is that I added the wrong race should have added a 0-90 10f race instead of the 20f race. I thought one 10f race would be enough but was wrong in this case. Next season there is a case to remove the 10f 2yo race and replace it with a 10f 3+ race. Have no idea why we have so many 10f 2yo races. Doesn't reflect reality at all

The other thing we should do is drop the flat stable size back to 20.
This will stretch the top stables influence in Group races.
It will also drop field sizes.
It will also make it easier for trainers (especially lower ranked trainers) to find suitable races for all their horses.
AND it 'should' free up Group races for the better trainers and horses so a lower rated trainer like myself doesn't enter a 0-65 horse in a G1 just because I want to see my horse race because I can't find another race that would be suitable.

I believe the flat stable size was raised to 25 because there was a concern that being able to enter two horses per race would make the fields too small.
After 3 or more seasons we now know this isn't the case.

It will also make it easier to map out the schedule as we wont need to cover as many bases.

A 20 horse flat stable will also ease the demands of the volunteers and in all seriousness, they are the people we should be looking after. Without volunteers - the league stops!

Doug

Agree Doug

Have to agree with Doug here, if more people commit & stay committed for the 13 weeks to helping the league run, then all good, add away, but the limited team for both RR & Comms as well as handicappers are in no position to keep increasing their workload, so a return to the 20 stable as Doug points out is probably the way to go.

Some of us have life's

Very true

Also id have no problem helping the league out in whatever to help some of yous out.

I was all for the increase to 25 at the time but there does seem to be a good case for reducing it back now especially as we seem to be getting more people joining.

Reducing it to 22 first may be a step in the right direction. We could always do with more runners in NH so if people really wanted to have 55 horses maybe we could up the NH stable by the amount we reduce the flat.

Another option would be to remove the transfer window as this results in lots of poor horses being replaced by middling horses for the lower trainers thus filling out the 0-100 handicaps but leaving the 0-70s less populated.

How do you fancy signing up for commentator school Ryan. Have you got a microphone. If so pick a race or two and have a practice. Send me a recording and we can give you a go if you fancy it