Apartheid Ended? Check! Now Get Rid of those Vuvuzelas!

With the World's greatest excuse for public chanting having started in South Africa, there is still one local racing fixture on the agenda today: Dresden Racecourse's main raceday of the year, the remains of the traditional two-day meet.

Surprisingly unfazed by Berlin's big day last weekend, a one-off event that included the G2 Preis der Hauptstadtregion and the G3 Benazet-Rennen (replacement races for the cancelled Baden-Baden spring meet), the Sachsen-Preis (Listed) field is just as outstanding as last year's. I don't think I've seen such an assortment of horses known for both potential and inconsistency before. Of 11 starters, 8 have won or placed in Class A races over their last 6 starts, almost all of them have also ended up up the track in the same class several times.

Best of all: no vuvuzelas (two World Cup games in the books and I already hate those things)

This marks the first time in more than a month that I'll watch a German race live and place a bet on it. Not coincidentally also the first time since all of my ADWs decided not to renew their license for the German simulcast stream. The reason they didn't is quite simple: the German stream costs about five times as much as one of the two British ones, shows roughly 10% of the number of races and - even according to the projections of German Racing, the sport's own promoter - creates far less handle.*

I could of course open an account with one of the ADWs that still keep the German stream. I'll do that at some point in the future, but quite frankly this might be the drop that breaks the camel's water, or somesuch. I'm fed up with running after the providers for the privilege of betting into their pools, which – considering the 30% takeout – I do out of pity more than anything else. On a related subject, I also didn't spend the 10 minutes or so it would have taken to find a P2P stream for ABC on Belmont Day. If NYRA doesn't think it should provide overseas customers with any opportunity to see the main races, it obviously doesn't want overseas business. Must be glorious if you can afford yourself that luxury. I've never said that about a Triple Crown race before, but the 2010 Belmont definitely wasn't a must-see.

* (numbers from memory; German Racing's business concept, which I got them from, doesn't seem to be online anymore)

45 Days to Go... Or 136... Or...

Iffezheim Racecourse near Baden-Baden, by far the most important track in Germany, has been slipping in out of bankruptcy for about a year now (publicly; much longer behind the scenes). Its most recent (potential) savior is Infront, a renowned Swiss-based sports promoter, more exactly its Chairman Andreas Jacobs, who also part-owns Deutsche See (Germany's leading wholesaler of frozen seafood), but more importantly is also the Chairman of Gestüt Fährhof, one of Germany's most important thoroughbred owners and breeders.

Fährhof, which took the unusual step of turning into a not-for-profit foundation a few years before the passing of its founder Walther J. Jacobs (Andreas' grandfather), is currently represented Internationally by Quijano and has also campaigned the likes of Silvano, Sabiango, Borgia and Black Sam Bellamy in not-too-distant memory. Still, it may be most prominent as a breeder, the place where such sires as Acatenango, Lomitas and Surumu left their mark on the breed.

On March 23, Baden-Baden Racecourse's prospective new operator issued a press release which was, for whatever reason, received very positively by most of the International racing media, although it didn't announce any substantial new developments, other than finally confirming the open secret that Baden's highly important Spring meet was indeed cancelled (read the Racing Post's account).

What first dampened my enthusiasm about the "upbeat" announcement is the fact that, as of April 14, the club's own website is the only one in the world that still announces the next race date for May 22, and has a countdown ticking for a long-cancelled race date. In fact, the Internationaler Club's news section has not been updated to include anything about the press release.
The news coming since then (and also the news NOT coming) is some cause for alarm, because as of yet absolutely nothing – incl. Baden's summer meet – is definite, other than the fact that the "hope that all the legal niceties have been sorted out" was unjustified. An important notary meeting set for last Thursday was postponed until today. The city (which owns the property) and investor still have not come to definite terms on a lease and therefor on the contract itself.
Meanwhile, the Direktorium's (racing board's) plan to transfer as many as possible of the spring meet's feature races to other tracks had an official deadline set for April 11, but did go into overtime, with a final result to be expected tomorrow (Update: as of April 27, it's still not 100% airtight, but it seems very likely that all Group and a couple of the other races will be run on other tracks).*

In local news, Dresden Racecourse's high-flying dreams of installing a large photovoltaic system in the infield (and thereby making roughly the handle of one of their racedays in annual profit) were pretty much scrapped by the city. In response to the discontinuation of the Listed Preis der Dreijährigen, Dresden Racecourse has announced a new Listed race, the Dresdner Herbstpreis, to be run on the traditional final date in mid-November, over 2200 meters for 3yo's & up, thereby adding actual sporting importance to what has already become a favorite day for most racegoers.**

* Thanks go out to Rüdiger Schmanns, Manager Racing Department at the Direktorium, for giving me this information in the form of a prompt email response to a question asked via their website's "contact" box.

** Race not officially announced yet and therefor subject to change (although it seems safe it will be scheduled). Distance and age group info as per phone conversation with the club's executive director, Uwe Tschirch (here too, thanks for a thorough update are in order).

(Panoramio image on top is by Sigi2)

Of Canadians, Cinderellas & Solar Cells

Late entry, but not too late (also, the third Raceday 360 post with a title starting with Of... in only two days). I intended to handicap the E P Taylor and Canadian International today, then got carried away, first by Newmarket’s Champions Day, then by a quite stunning press release issued by Dresden Racecourse.

The Champions Day’s highlight, the G1 Champion Stakes produced a mild surprise in Twice Over’s win as well as a surprisingly-surprising-to-a-surprisingly-large-number-of-surprised-people hapless performance by the favorite Fame And Glory (which came telegraphed to everyone who paid attention to the Arc).
The undercard – if you want to use the term for 5 group races and one of those “Heritage” handicaps that really deserve the title - the Cesarewitch over Newmarket’s entire Beacon Course – saw a 33-1 G1 Dewhurst upset by yet another colt named Beethoven (in yet another case of 1-2-4 Ballydoyle dominance), Ashalanda extending the Aga Khan’s Awesome October in the G2 Pride Stakes, and Dresden File favorite Akmal topping a rags-to-riches-y season with a 7th win in 11 starts by ways of an impressive victory in the G3 Jockey Club Cup.

On the homefront, Dresden Racecourse announced that it has entered an agreement to install Germany’s largest inner-city plant of photovoltaic collectors in the racetrack infield, which may not look all that great in combination with the wooden landmark-registered grandstand. On the plus side, the 25 million € project should ensure the quality of the racing product (Dresden itself is comparatively well off, thanks to attendence figures which habitually outnumber all but the very big German tracks, but due to the remote location problems of the other East German tracks hurt Dresden, too).

As to the initial topic of the post, the Canadian International at Woodbine once again falls short of what a 2 Mio race could offer if it was scheduled a little better, with the European contingent looking particularly weak. It's a wide open field with 7/1-longshot Buccellati probably representing the value bet; 11/2 Champs Elysees and 6/1 Quijano being the underlays.


Not falling short at all is this year’s edition of the E P Taylor Stakes:

#1 Treat Gently – on class alone, the Vermeille-3rd and Opera-4th is a ridiculous overlay at 8/1 ML, but this is only her second start of the year, the other one being a convinving Alw win at Belmont in July; again competes on a track where her running style shouldn’t be that much of a disadvantage and look to be a contender here

#2 Rainbow View – British-based Dynaformer filly was the winner of the G1 Matron at Leopardstown last out and has also shown she can stay the distance, but she has had a long season and looks questionable at an 8/5 ML; then again, there is the dreaded First-Time-Lasix factor

#3 Lahaleeb – unimpressive in her last two starts, and on Euro forms has to be rated below #1 and #2; long season too and runs without Lasix; jockey switch doesn’t help either

#4 Eastern Aria – good forms in high-level Conditions and Handicap races in Britain and France, but has yet to make her graded debut; second-to-last form upgraded considerably by winner and 3rd-place finisher; campaigning without layoff since early February though, and 16th start of the year might prove one too many; FTL

#5 Princess Haya – first graded victory winning the G2 Canadian S. Over course last time out; class, speed figs and added distance remain concerns and make 7/2 ML an underlay in this field

#6 Look Here – hmm, a Hernando horse on FTL! The 2008 Epsom Oaks winner kept herself in the best of companies in Europe and didn’t look half-bad; distance may be too short for her and trainer’s inexperience with transatlantic shipping is a concern, but 3/1 ML looks reasonable

#7 Roses n’ Wine – only Canadian filly in the field comes of an OSS Algoma romp, but has repeatedly shown limitations in graded company

#8 Salve Germania – mind-boggling improvement when winning the Ballston Spa in her North America debut, thus hard to handicap here; this is still a major step up in class for the now Pletcher-stabled filly;

Summary:

Six European runners in a field of eight plus Princess Haya (the filly) make for more than this race’s fair share of sporting interest, but also make this another tough one to bet.
Rainbow View and Look Here are the obvious choices, but the Euro trio of Treat Gently, Eastern Aria and Lahaleeb represent better value at hard-to-believe MLs of 8/1, 12/1 and 12/1, respectively. If it wasn’t for Woodbine’s exotics takeout, this one would look like a perfect case for the dime superfecta, but with things the way they are, my tip is #1 Treat Gently, who, if coming anywhere near last fall’s form (and according to her Belmont form and workouts, she likely will) should make this one a memorable race for any across-the-board bettor. I might play a trifecta (or triactor) with some combination of her and #2 and 6 just for the hunch, takeout be damned.

Results:

First: Woodbine's morning line person had a really bad day; I've never seen MLs so far off under normal weather conditions, let alone for two major races in a row.

E P Taylor: huge upset by #3 Lahaleeb (eventually 45-1) because a) she's a pretty good horse, and b) because all of the more likely candidates got used up in an almost comical (if I hadn't had money on this race) chase after a no-hoper (#7) to fade hopelessly in the stretch.

Cdn Int'l: Won by #1 Champs Elysees, a horse I've come to memorize several years ago for his uncanny ability to find a way to lose even when he looked unbeatable, who then deviated several times before seemingly returning to his path, but who closed his career in style.
He profited from the fact that Buccellati would have won easily if aiming forward, but unfortunately wasted half his energy struggling against the jockey to get a closer look at the grandstand and was ultimately lucky to finish third.

In both races, a moderate early pace was followed by plain crazy mid-session bursts; both races were won by horses who kept out of that freak show and passed tired horses, ridiculing the "superstar jockeys" part of the whole affair.
That being said, congrats to William Buick, the young English rider who scored his first graded/group win in the E P Taylor, then made the best out of a tough ride on Buccellati.

Still Sitting Empty, But...

(Panoramio image by Helmut Fischer)

We’re finally there. Dresden Racecourse’s greatest weekend of the year has arrived, and so have Dresden’s two Listed events of the the season.

Saturday’s feature is the 20.000€ Freiberger-Premium-Preis, historically known as the Preis der Dreijährigen, a Derby prep over 2000m. The relatively high prestige of this race is based mainly on producing back-to-back Derby winners in 1994's Laroche and 1995's ill-fated supertalent All My Dreams. The latter was the last Derby winner to prep at Dresden, although Derby runner-up’s Night Tango (2005) and Dickens (2006) came awfully close.

Of this year’s starters, only the unbeaten Navajo Dancer could be on somebody’s Derby shortlist, but it’s a fine field anyway. There’s no one who has won anything of real importance yet, but there are two or three very promising stayers who are just one or two steps away from entering the Derby picture. After all, that’s what you want to see in a 2000m Listed event for 3yo’s at this time of year.

What you wish for in a 2000m Listed race for older horses are starters who have been reasonably close in Group races, or who have proven competitive on this level before. The Sachsen Preis, Sunday’s 20K feature, far exceeds that standard. 4yo filly Goathemala starts for the first time this year, she won the G3 Frankfurter Stutenpreis last time out. Other season debutants are Schützenjunker (who is extremely inconsistent, but hasn’t earned 130K in eight lifetime starts for nothing) and Andre Fabre transfer El Comodin, who finished on the board in a French 52K Listed race on his last attempt. El Comodin was bred in Ireland, but is by German-bred champion sire Monsun and out of German-bred three-time G1-winning mare Elle Danzig (by Roi Danzig), which makes his current record of a won Listed race at Chantilly and a fourth-place finish in the G2 Prix Guillaume d’Ornano at Deauville almost disappointing. More International color is added by Classical Word (by El Prado), one of the top Danish horses in training (admittedly that doesn’t take very much).

N.B.: You gotta love this lifetime record for 13yo gelding Aladan (by Danehill, no less) heading into Saturday’s 3rd:

143 (12-10-13)

Lost In Translation

As fortunately as it is surprising, no one around here seems to be in the early stages of hysteria in anticipation of this week’s visit of the American Messiah-elect to our (really not that) humble town.

Unlike the prophets of old however, Obama is poised to block our way through the raging waters (or over them, for that matter), as the bridge I would usually take to my job will be closed for security reasons on Thursday.

Anyway, the reason I posted today is that Pull The Pocket has brought it to the blogosphere’s attention that Poker Channel Europe yesterday started to televise American racing in a daily hour-long show. PCE is an extremely remote digital channel available on a very limited number of cable systems, but one that can be viewed using Zattoo.

Poker and Racing, by the way, are a natural match. Both are the only two forms of gambling in which skill and determination can give you a winning percentage. Both are also the only ones in which the house (at least theoretically) can be neutral towards the result as long as the handle is high enough.

I was intrigued by the concept for a couple of minutes, even more so when I clicked the link on PCE’s website to get further information and realized that their program is actually presented and produced by Equi8, a relatively new and very promising German web channel/ADW which is for the most part a continuation/copy of defunct Premiere Win. P-Win was a German channel dedicated almost exlusively to American horse racing run by pay-per-view service Premiere, but it was actually available for free and streamed its entire program (6pm-2am weekdays, ca. 2pm-2am weekends) online.

It had its pitfalls, but nevertheless it was easily the best of several failed attempts at establishing a racing channel in Germany. One of its best features was a crew of really good commentators, ranging from longtime analysts to active jockeys and trainers.

After watching half an hour of the “Equi8 Happy Hour”’s lead-in program (virtual poker, no kidding) I was sure I knew what to expect, and that it wouldn’t be bad. After all, what could go wrong with a studio crew of longtime veteran Michael Luxenburger and Thorsten Castle, the track announcer at Munich Racecourse and a brilliant promoter at times (both are P-Win alumni)?

I was gonna find out soon enough: they were forced to moderate in English. Both aren’t bad at English, but both aren’t nearly good enough to go On Air speaking it, mainly because they have too detectable an accent and lack the easy slap-of-tongue they master in their native language. The program had a studio crew that can be a joy to listen to, and used it in a way that made listening to them an ordeal. That’s wasted talent, and a textbook case of offending two audiences by trying to be everything to everyone.

Let’s be honest for a second: how large does PCE assess the market in Cyprus, Croatia and Belgium to be? As long as they aren’t allowed to show it in the UK or Ireland, the market for this show is Germany. And if they would be allowed, they’d find out the hard way that no native speaker would listen to a bunch of accent-plagued Germans using mispronounced English to discuss American racing. If you assemble a team of some of the best German racing analysts, why not use that potential rather than have them struggle uncomfortably through moderations that end up lacking, or worse?

10.099 Beats 7.412, But Not By Much

In all the euphoria over yesterday’s atmosphere at Belmont Park, where 10.099 racegoers apparently had a great time, I was relieved that I wasn’t the only one struck by how low this number really was. Just over 10.000? On a public holiday, in beautiful weather, with one of the most prestigious handicaps of the continent on the card? Dresden had 7.412 for this year’s only raceday so far. And horse racing is by no means a generally more popular sport over here.

That’s 7.412 in a city of 500.000, which (no matter how often English-language Wikipedia wants to ignore the objections by me and other editors) isn’t part of any metropolitan area. It’s for a raceday on which the “feature” was a Hcp D for 4.600€, on the same weekend on which Dresden also hosted the largest Dixieland festival outside New Orleans, among other alternatives.

For all they screw up in every other part of marketing the sport, the one thing German racecourses do well is marketing themselves as an outdoor event. There are several thousand regular racegoers (especially families) in any city with a track who don’t have any interest in the sport on any other than raceday, but who attend for the atmosphere and side attractions alone. They will usually only make a couple of spice-up bets at minimum stake amount, spread out over the day. Yet the racetracks profit from the admission and programmes paid and the revenue generated from on-site beer gardens, cafés, vendors, pony rides and other attractions.

Due to the, self-inflicted, absence of meaningful off-track handle (on Dresden’s first raceday, only 40,4% of the 108K total handle were off-site), this source of income is increasingly vital for the continuing existence of the sport in our remote corner of the Thoroughbred world.

Good attendance is great for the horseplayers too. Because a large portion of the handle comes from people who aren’t really dedicated handicappers, it’s much easier to find quality bets at a good price, the level of competition is much lower (although in Germany this is somewhat offset by the difficulty of getting meaningful information).

I’m aware that it’s easier to get good attendance figures if you only have a dozen of racedays per year to promote, but then nobody forces NYRA to run two stakes races every weekend. This way, they’re teaching the audience that a comparable product will be offered all the time, thus diminishing the incentive to attend today, or tomorrow. It would be easier to attract large crowds if they would create several racedays when the product offered (on the courses and around the paddock) far exceeds the usual levels, then promote only those days, and leave the rest to the few that will come anyway and have little interest in the side attractions. This is the way the Paris tracks do it, and it works fine for them.

Of course, it would be even better for NYRA to realize that even in the “Golden Age” they ran hardly a third of the number of races, but I’m trying to be realistic here.

No Infield Trouble Expected Over Here

Today, this season finally kicks off at Dresden-Seidnitz Racecourse, about five weeks later than usual. Dresden, which usually started in early to mid-April, always tried to get its first race date later in the year, because of the lower likelihood of bad weather. It never got its will though, since other tracks insisted on their traditional claims to those dates at the annual meeting of Eastern German racing secretaries (because Eastern German racecourses are considerably better managed than Western, Southwestern and most Northern tracks, they are effective in avoiding conflicting dates, which unfortunately is worth special mention). So eventually they got rid of the date by striking the raceday all together, which follows the general trend, although the reduction in race dates is far less dramatic in Eastern Germany.

They may have kicked themselves for doing it though. We had great weather practically all through April (its not that good today), and a race day on the traditional date would have been a dunker. Also, I would have preferred to get rid of today’s date, which directly competes with Dresden Dixieland, the biggest jazz festival outside North America, which is expected to attract more than 500.000 visitors again, and should draw away at least a thousand from the track. That’s bad news, because with German racing’s ineptitude to market its product and the declining off-track handle this causes, German racedays are increasingly dependent on on-track handle and attendance.

And because I know it’s the race you all have your eyes on today, the play of the day is #1 First Lilly in the third, one of two 3yo races with quite attractive fields.

I planned on taking a few photos and posting them this evening, but unfortunately my new camera, a bold 12,08€ investment on eBay (includes shipping), hasn't arrived yet.