NZTR Board Support Continuation of Jumps Racing

The New Zealand Thoroughbred Racing (NZTR) Board has today confirmed their support for the continuation of Jumps racing as part of the racing programme. This decision follows a process announced in September that included the appointment of a Jumps Racing Review Panel.

The panel resolved to recommend that Jumps racing in New Zealand should continue, but that continuation will need to be supported by several initiatives to ensure the success of the industry, both in the short and long term.

“The panel have taken a comprehensive review of Jumps racing in NZ and whilst the recommendation is for the continuation it is not for jumps racing to continue in its current state, changes do need to be made to give it the best chance to thrive,” said Darin Balcombe, NZTR COO and Jumps Racing Review Panel Chair.

The panel provided 19 individual recommendations with priorities that include:

• Supporting, mentoring and attracting Jumps jockeys
• Reviewing and optimising the Jumps racing calendar
• Enhancing race programming for consistency and competition
• Ensuring fit-for-purpose infrastructure and rules

The panel has also recommended NZTR develop key performance indicators to evaluate Jumps racing’s performance annually and a comprehensive strategic review every three years to ensure objectives and performance are aligned.

NZTR Chairman Russell Warwick applauded the panel for their hard work and collaboration throughout the review process.

“I would like to thank the panel and Alan Galbraith KC for their support throughout this process. Many factors were taken into consideration, and we believe implementing the panel’s recommendations will give Jumps racing the best opportunity to perform at a high-level long term,” he said

“This decision gives the industry the opportunity to reenergize Jumps racing and will make winter racing an exciting prospect into the future.”

The full Jumps Racing Review Panel Recommendations Report can be found using the link below.

NZTR’s implementation process will include creating a framework and outlining KPIs to measure Jumps racing’s performance annually, to be delivered prior to 31 March 2025.

Click HERE to read full report – Fortuna Racing and Te Akau Racing are big supporters of jumps racing in NZ (not to mention Victoria as well) – the recommendations in this report are very positive – the panel have done a good job here and we believe the implementation of these recommendations can only enhance the jumping scene here in NZ

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Fortuna 2yo Filly TITAHI BAY wins her debut trial at Taupo stylishly

Titahi Bay (Spirit Of Boom – Aotearower)  delighted her small army of owners when winning her first trial at Taupo over 900 metres in the hands of Wiremu Pinn – the drums have been beating for a while about “Boomer” and she seems to have a lot of quality about her. A graduate of the January 2024 Magic Millions Gold Coast Sale, she was acquired by David Ellis/Fortuna Racing for A$100k from the draft of Cambridge Stud after being passed in at A$140k – so once again we have managed to buy very well – she is set to trial again at Pukekohe Dec 17th and all going well she may make her race day debut after that. Trial replay can be seen HERE

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Shares in our recent RTR Sale acquisition, the 2yo Filly by Swiss Ace, moving steadily – 28% still available – see more below
 

We had a highly successful day 20th November at the New Zealand Bloodstock Ready To Run Sale. The sale itself was very successful with many high priced lots and this was no surprise, given the buoyancy in the Global Racing market at the present time, particularly in Australia and with a strong buying bench from Hong Kong

As always we like to buy to budget and with a very high focus on “physical type” and so we needed to be thinking very much outside the square in terms of the lots we identified – one of the things about the Ready to Run sale is that it is very popular with the Asian market, in particular Hong Kong and also with the closure of Singapore, the Malaysian trainers were very active as well – however these markets tend not to buy Fillies and focus on Colts in the main and so our focus was to be on the Fillly options – in the end we identified four Fillies from day one of the sale – two of these failed their Vet inspections and one we had identified in particular, that we thought would meet our budget, was the Swiss Ace Filly out of an El Rocamare and with a great Vet report and a budget of $80,000 to buy her, we managed to secure her for $70,000 and so “mission accomplished”

Interesting to note that Mark Walker and I have been going through the catalogue for at least the past four weeks and time and time again as we would review and consider the options, Mark would keep coming back to this Filly, saying to me how well she had breezed up and how he thought she would be the one to make our budget. I joined Mark at the sales grounds yesterday morning where we inspected all of the horses on his and David’s list and as the Swiss Ace Filly paraded for us Mark kept commenting to me“this is a lovely Filly”

Mark has sent through the following comments. “John, as you know, you and I have been talking about this Filly for a few  weeks now, as I had identified her earlier in the piece as having the right physical characteristics to make a lovely racehorse – her breeze up at Te Rapa four weeks ago was first class and when we inspected her at the sales grounds this morning, I certainly wasn’t disappointed with what I saw. She is a lovely physical type with a great walk, is of  good medium size and demonstrated a very pleasant temperament. I think she will be the sort of Filly that could come into work at the stables very soon, trial late summer and have a race day start or two as a two year-old, but she’s got all the scope in the world to develop into a lovely three-year-old type”

David Ellis also comments as follows “John, congratulations on securing this lovely Swiss Ace Filly today within your budget – Mark and I were very impressed with her breeze up and how she paraded for us today at inspections. I think she will definitely run as an autumn two year old and has plenty of scope to be a successful three year old as well.”

On the pedigree front, Swiss Ace, in my view, is an underrated Sire, but with 366 winners (including 19 Stakes winners) from just over 500 runners, he can certainly leave a quality race horse. The dam is by El Roca and is a a half sister to the Stakes winner, Ichiban. Swiss Ace is the Sire of Niance, who won the Group 3 How Now Stakes at Caulfield last Saturday and who has now fashioned a record of 6 wins from 10 starts

Click HERE to see the link to her breeze up clip – she breezed up in 10.74 secs and as you will see, she has a beautiful galloping action

Here below is her pedigree