Going global worth it despite ups and downs
Helene Vitality's failed Melbourne Cup assault has come and gone, but the globalisation of racing competition continues. While Grandera arrived on Monday night to continue a preparation aimed at the Hong Kong Cup and securing the title of world champion, Hong Kong's Red Sun and the evergreen Indigenous yesterday headed for the Japan Cups, dirt and proper, in Tokyo.
Perhaps Hong Kong's top level of racing is at a point now where fans are impatient to see another international hopeful return with the right part of the prizemoney, instead of high aspirations that end empty-handed or even bringing back second or third.
But fans, and all involved, need to remember that the rewards and kudos that go with international success in horse racing are very hard won. Any chance Helene Vitality may have had in the Melbourne Cup may have been lost at the start, when he struck his head and lacerated his mouth, making the task of settling him impossible.
Or it may have been lost in the draw when he was always going to run the risk of facing the breeze for a long way. Or perhaps it was lost on the flint hard track that left many horses from the meeting hurt or retired.
Reasons, perhaps. Excuses, certainly. But racing is like that. Bear in mind that Godolphin, year-in, year-out as powerful a big-race force as any stable on the planet, have been taking multiple runners to the Melbourne Cup for the past six or seven years and are yet to show a win.
No one said it was easy, but David Hayes scoffed at any suggestion it was too difficult to try again, and that's what the sport has always been about and what it is now becoming on a world, rather than national, scale.
Red Sun and Indigenous will be the next to take aim on foreign fields, closely followed by the home-ground fixture on December 15 when we hope at least one of Hong Kong's best can turn the super spectacle into a real celebration.
Have no doubt the entire world has the same mind when it comes to the immediate challenges facing the horse racing sport in its mature form - turnover and the protection of it and the globalisation of major events were the hot ideas during Melbourne Cup week as they are in Hong Kong.
On the globalisation front, the Australian Jockey Club is canvassing for interest in its autumn carnival at Royal Randwick during March-April next year. With the establishment of a permanent quarantine training venue in Sydney, with the same kinds of facilities that exist at Melbourne's Sandown, there is hope that overseas runners might begin to arrive for major events, such as the A$2.5 million Doncaster Handicap (1,600m), A$2.5 million AJC Australian Derby (2,400m), or several of the other million-dollar events.
Hong Kong seems sure to be one of the main centres targeted and it is not so far fetched. Two years ago, Ivan Allan toyed with plans to run Aucash in the Derby and Indigenous in the Sydney Cup, and Fairy King Prawn was once mooted as a possible Doncaster Handicap runner.
The Melbourne Cup carnival has taken enormous benefit from the presence of the Europeans in the past decade, but not without criticism. On one side of the coin, many Australian trainers and owners have complained this year that the large proportion of overseas visitors denied the dreams of homegrown stayers.
The other side is that this would have been one of the weakest Melbourne Cups in modern history were it not for the international presence. Clubs are taking the optimistic view that it is good for profile and wider interest.
The three crowds of over 100,000 at Flemington during the four Cup week meetings pushed the attendance well over the records of 2001, so the Melbourne idea is getting something right.
Sydney in the southern autumn is the equivalent of Melbourne in the spring, though, while the standard of racing is arguably higher, the atmosphere of Melbourne Cup week is not replicated anywhere.
Distance, timing and a lack of benefit for breeding careers will ensure little interest in the Sydney autumn from Europe or North America. However, the Australian Jockey Club is hopeful that South African and Asian nations will at least give it serious thought.
On the protection of turnover, the Australian Racing Board believes it is getting closer to an agreement with the off-track, Internet-style bookmakers around Australia, especially those in the Northern Territory, that they will contribute funds to the benefit of the racing industry.
On-track bookmakers have always been required to contribute via various fees, but those operating off-track exist under a protective cover from the maverick states where they are based and it will be a matter of whether bookies believe, long term, that it is in their interests to assist the health of the racing on which they operate.
But there is clear concern in Australian administration about the emergence of betting exchanges like Britain's Betfair - widely rumoured to begin operations on Hong Kong racing in the near future - and Australian operator TwoFlys, which do not fall under licensing as bookmakers.
