Jones pads up for RV’s innovation battle
Besieged Racing Victoria chief executive Andrew Jones continued to hit the airwaves yesterday in the organisation’s bid to win the public relations battle in the wake of a series of leaks about a controversial proposal for race meetings modelled on Formula One motor racing and Big Bash cricket.
The plans, which became public despite participants briefed on the proposal signing non-disclosure agreements, are for a series of whip-free metropolitan race meetings conducted using teams of trainers and jockeys potentially being mic’d up during races, with the aim of enticing a younger demographic to take an interest in horse racing.
Jones, who first spoke in the industry–owned Racing.com on Tuesday, revealed yesterday that RV was able to keep the plans under wraps for six weeks before the proposal was leaked in the past fortnight, forcing the administrator to hit media street over the past two days.
Victorian Jockeys Association chief executive Matt Hyland, specifically addressing what Jones has told the media in a series of interviews in the past two days, said race riding was “a lot different to driving a car”.
He is among a number of Victorian industry participants who have signed non-disclosure agreements when initially briefed on RV’s proposed innovations.
“Based on what Andrew’s put out there in the media, they are looking at these innovations and ideas and are workshopping their way through what their view is on it,” Hyland told ANZ Bloodstock News yesterday.
“Some of the conversations around miking jockeys up, it would need a lot of follow-up discussion, put it that way.
“If being mic’ed up during a race is what’s being proposed, then we think that’d be problematic. Maybe pre– and post-race, there could be further discussion around it, but riding during a race requires a whole level of concentration, so I don’t think it’d be practical, but I’m mindful that I’m sure there’ll be ongoing discussions around it.”
Jones appeared to water down the miking up of jockeys yesterday, going from reported suggestions that trainers could be talking to the riders throughout a race to it only being pre-race and after the race has been run.
He also hinted that if the whip-free race meetings and the associated changes, such as miked up jockeys and “teams racing” did proceed, most likely at Moonee Valley, it was probable that they would be introduced in 2024 rather than later this year.
The draft proposal, Jones said, was for it to be conducted for four race meetings.
“WSPs [wagering service providers] are very excited about innovation, they’re pushing us to innovate, which we have been doing and we continue to do with the tenth race [on Saturdays] for example, and they’ll create new products associated with the new leads,” Jones told RSN.
“The macro question is, is there a 100 per cent chance the new concept will be successful? Of course there’s not a 100 per cent chance. If people want certainty, they’re in the wrong business. There’s nothing certain in racing.
“Everybody’s punting on racing all the time by betting on them or buying them and training them. As long as everyone understands that… we can move forward.”
OTI Racing’s Terry Henderson provided a measured response when asked about RV’s proposed innovations, but cautioned against putting too much emphasis on significant change at the expense of more pressing issues.
“Innovation should be looked at in any business and that’s just a healthy thing,” Henderson told ANZ Bloodstock News.
“I think I’d rather them go down the process with key stakeholders a little further before they actually went to the market, as it were, with their ideas, because people will quickly get an adverse reaction and stick with it whereas some of the ideas might have a lot more merit than people initially think.
“Personally, I think there’s far bigger issues to be addressed in the short-term, in Victoria particularly, with what we are doing here.
“I think we have a very pressured operation in Victoria on costs and that’s only been exacerbated in the past week with the announcement of workers’ compensation (premiums rising) and, as a result of that, that’s where the focus should be by getting the current business really well-structured financially as we go forward into a difficult time.”
Henderson was also not against whip-free racing, something mooted as part of the ideas floated by Jones and his management team, with the syndicator pointing to France as an example of a jurisdiction where races are run without heavy use of the persuader.
“I don’t mind the idea, to be honest, even though it’s more (about) the public perception of racing of not using the whip in the last 200 metres,” the OTI Racing principal said.
“Racing’s fastest sectional is usually the 400 to the 200 metres, so that’s perhaps where the whip can be stopped and obviously you would hope that the momentum of the horses and the fact that the horse is already full of adrenaline at that stage, so it wouldn’t diminish or change the result.
“That said, while we don’t have Racing Australia (as an overarching decision maker), we’re skating around this issue as we have for the last five years.”
Jockeys are, apprentices excluded, independent contractors and so it was up to each individual to determine whether they want to participate in whip-free races, Hyland said.
“There wasn’t any feedback but what I can say is that RV reserves the right to run events and conditions around what they see fit and then the participants reserve the right on what they want to participate in,” the VJA chief executive said.
“At the end of the day, we don’t control the schedule, we don’t control the conditions those races are run under, so that falls back to individuals as to whether they want to ride in races with those conditions.”
Henderson said restricting the whip or banning it all together would help the perception issue. “If you ask people who are against racing why, if they accept racing in some form, the issue that they dislike is the use of the whip,” he said.
“If they don’t like racing at all, you may as well talk to the wall, but most people who are on the fence as far as racing is concerned don’t like the use of the whip.
“I think most people understand that a whip has to be carried as a crop as a safety measure for the jockey, but it’s when it’s used as a persuader (that can cause perception issues).”
Jones reiterated that wagering turnover on Victorian racing had hurt the body’s bottom line to the tune of $30 million last season, while turnover in July was down 15 per cent year-on-year, forcing a reduction of prize-money in 2023-24.
Outspoken Flemington trainer Wayne Hawkes was “gobsmacked” by what’s transpired in recent weeks in relation to RV, pointing out that racing wasn’t immune from wider economic conditions.
“The only time where we were inside the bubble was when we were in Covid and we were literally the only show on the road that didn’t stop,” Hawkes told SEN radio yesterday.
“So, our numbers went through the roof, and for good reason, now we’re back to reality. Is it all that doom and gloom?”
RV will distribute more than $315 million in prize-money this season, down $2.5 million on last year, and Henderson says “there is still good money in the industry”.
“It is still a bloody healthy industry compared to some other places,” he said.
Respected form analyst and ratings guru Daniel O’Sullivan, whose clients include Newgate Farm, blamed much of the negative discourse directed towards Jones and RV as a result of poor communication and the ill-conceived comparisons between horse racing and Formula One.
“None of that seems to have been thought through, or if it has, it’s not communicated and that’s at the heart of the problems RV is having with stakeholder and public perception on a whole range of issues,” O’Sullivan wrote yesterday.
“There’s smart people at RV that have done and are trying to do many great things. In my personal experience over the years I’ve found them to be terrific on many fronts… but the communication strategy is leaving a lot to be desired.”