Category Archives: Horse Racing

Reported plan to move Rosehill racecourse to endangered bell frog habitat surprises conservationists

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Horse racing industry insiders said to be pushing for Sydney track to be relocated to former brickpit in Olympic Park – a sanctuary to an unlikely urban survivor

Conservations have expressed surprise at reported plans to move Sydney’s Rosehill racecourse to a historic brickpit at Olympic Park, which is home to a colony of endangered green and golden bell frogs.

The plan has reportedly been devised by racing bosses, alongside the deal between the Australian Turf Club and the New South Wales government to redevelop the famous track into new housing, as well as two additional metro stations.

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Women at Cheltenham feel threatened by pop-up strip clubs, says minister

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Alex Chalk urges local council where racing festival takes place to stop granting licences to such venues

The presence of pop-up strip clubs at Cheltenham is making women feel “threatened and intimidated” at one of Britain’s biggest race festivals, the justice secretary has said.

Alex Chalk, the MP for Cheltenham, challenged the local council to stop granting licences to so-called sexual entertainment venues (SEVs).

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‘Tallest jockey in the world’ has rival for the title at Cheltenham

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Thomas Costello, who at 6ft 4in is same height as Jack Andrews, says ‘people in weighing room looked at me like I had four heads’

You don’t come across many lofty figures in the weighing rooms of the UK’s racecourses but two jockeys standing at a (relatively) towering 223cm (6ft 4in) will rub shoulders when the Cheltenham festival begins on Tuesday.

Jack Andrews, 25, from Warwickshire, rose to fame last year when he was billed as the tallest jockey in the world during his appearance at the festival, but this week has a rival for the title – Thomas Costello, from County Clare in Ireland.

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Peter V’Landys accuses politicians of ‘outright lies’ as plan to extend Racing NSW chair Russell Balding’s tenure fails

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Racing body will need to scramble to replace chair after Coalition and crossbench team up to try to strengthen oversight

The Racing NSW chief executive, Peter V’Landys, has accused politicians of spreading “outright lies” and “mainly wrong diatribes” during the parliamentary debate that ultimately resulted in the loss of his chairman.

One of the most powerful men in Australian sport, V’Landys is overseen by the Racing NSW board. He has held the position of chief executive for nearly 20 years, 12 of those with Russell Balding as chair.

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‘Grave concerns’: backlash over NSW government’s controversial push to extend racing boss’s tenure

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Minns government faces legal and political fight as it attempts to pass laws to give Racing NSW chair unprecedented 14-year term

New South Wales crossbench MPs are fighting to amend controversial legislation that would extend the tenure of Racing NSW’s chairman for a third time and grant him an unprecedented 14-year term.

The Minns government is trying to rush through legislation in the final parliamentary sitting fortnight of the year to grant Russell Balding another two-year term at the helm of the powerful racing regulator’s board before his position expires on 18 December.

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NSW government seeks third extension of racing boss’s term as sector faces ‘challenging’ times

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Animal Justice party to fight state government’s ‘absurd’ move to extend Racing NSW chairman Russell Balding’s term

The New South Wales government will seek a third extension of Russell Balding’s term as chairman of Racing NSW despite Treasury recommending two-term limits for directors of state-owned firms.

The extension will require legislation to be passed before the end of the year, with Balding’s position ending on 18 December, alongside that of the deputy chair, Saranne Cooke, who the government also wants to retain.

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Melbourne Cup: most Australians have little or no interest in ‘race that stops the nation’, Essential poll finds

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Only 11% of respondents to survey say they have ‘high interest’, down five points from before last year’s race

Punters are switching off the Melbourne Cup, with a majority of Australians reporting they have little or no interest in what was once “the race that stops the nation”.

According to the latest Essential poll of 1,049 voters, just 11% reported a “high interest” in the Melbourne Cup, down five points from when the question was asked before the 2022 race.

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Flemington racecourse flood wall ‘served its purpose’, Victoria Racing Club boss tells inquiry

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Report into Maribyrnong floods says it is still unclear if construction of wall contributed to damage of residents’ homes

The head of Victoria Racing Club says a flood wall it erected around Melbourne’s Flemington racecourse “served its purpose” after the site was left undamaged during last October’s flooding that left nearby homesinundated.

Victoria Racing Club and Melbourne Water fronted a parliamentary inquiry on Wednesday into last October’s floods, after a report – commissioned by the water authority – into the Maribyrnong flooding that affected more than 500 homes was handed down on Friday. The review concluded it was unclear whether the flood wall had exacerbated flooding for residents, saying the available material did not allow a conclusion to be made.

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Singapore bids farewell to horse racing to free up land for housing

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City-state is to close its only turf club in order to redevelop 120-hectare site for public housing amid declining popularity of the sport

More than 180 years of horse racing in Singapore will soon come to an end, as the “land scarce” city state closes its only race course to make space for public housing.

The chairman of the Singapore Turf Club, Niam Chiang Meng, said the club was saddened by the decision, but that it also understood the “land needs” of Singapore. The 120-hectare site was a valuable resource, he said, adding: “This transition will serve to optimise land use for the greater good of the local community and future generations.”

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Calls for jump-racing ban after Grand National horse deaths

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Animal rights group Animal Aid says change needed after ‘brutal horrors’ at Aintree as three horses die during festival

Animal rights campaigners have called for jump racing to be banned and “much more stringent” safety measures put in place for the sport after three horses died at the 175th annual Grand National festival.

The third fatality, Hill Sixteen, is said to have suffered a broken neck at the first fence at the Aintree racecourse in Liverpool before being put down.

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Interest in Melbourne Cup slips with more than half of Australians uninterested, poll suggests

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Nearly half of those surveyed (45%) believe it promotes ‘unhealthy’ gambling and a third (34%) say it normalises animal cruelty

Australia’s love affair with the Melbourne Cup appears to be waning, with a new survey finding more than half have “low” or “no interest” in the race that traditionally stops the nation.

Amid growing support for the Nup to the Cup movement, the latest Guardian Essential poll also suggests almost half of those surveyed (45%) believe it promotes “unhealthy” gambling behaviour, with a third (34%) saying it normalises animal cruelty.

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Daniel Andrews dismisses concerns over independence of review into Flemington racetrack flood wall

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Melbourne Water chair John Thwaites, who was water minister when the wall was approved, will excuse himself from the review

Daniel Andrews has dismissed concerns over the independence of a review into the impact of a flood wall built to protect Flemington racetrack, which will be conducted by an organisation chaired by a former minister of the government that approved the structure.

The track was spared by Friday’s flooding while homes in neighbouring suburbs including Maribyrnong and Kensington were inundated, with some residents believing the wall pushed flood waters away from the track and into their homes.

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Revealed: how bookies clamp down on successful gamblers and exploit the rest

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Stake factoring is a way of grading customers according to their success and is widespread in the betting industry

On any given Saturday, Rory would spend several hours glued to a screen flickering with hundreds of football and horse racing bets placed by customers of the Irish bookmaker Paddy Power.

One of multiple insiders from firms including Paddy Power Betfair, Ladbrokes and William Hill who spoke on condition of anonymity, Rory was part of an obscure corner of the gambling industry that exists to maximise profits by clamping down on successful punters.

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Revealed: the huge British property empire of Sheikh Mohammed

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Holdings of more than 40,000 hectares in London, Scotland and Newmarket make Dubai ruler one of UK’s biggest landowners

The controversial ruler of Dubai has acquired a land and property empire in Britain that appears to exceed 40,000 hectares (100,000 acres), making him one of the country’s largest landowners, according to a Guardian analysis.

The huge property portfolio apparently owned by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum and his close family ranges from mansions, stables and training gallops across Newmarket, to white stucco houses in some of London’s most exclusive addresses and extensive moorland including the 25,000-hectare Inverinate estate in the Scottish Highlands.

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‘If you wanted to design a virus dispersion hub, you could do worse’: the Cheltenham Festival, one year on

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It was one of the last major sporting events before Britain went into lockdown in March 2020. Racegoers recall a tense week and its aftermath

When the roar of 65,000 people greeted the first race of the third day, at 1.30pm on Thursday 12 March last year, Geoff Bodman was feeling just fine. The 56-year-old painter and decorator from Tremorfa in Cardiff, whose friends call him “Boddie”, had been going to the Cheltenham Festival every year for 25 years. He had paid £30 for a ticket to the affordable Best Mate enclosure, where he planned to have a punt on the horses and a day on the beer. The following morning he’d be back in Cardiff, getting on with a job painting the outside of a house.

The week before, Bodman and his wife Julie, who worked in a Cardiff care home, had cancelled their second wedding anniversary trip to Venice. They had been looking forward to it for months, but Italy had become a hot spot for the new coronavirus. “We didn’t want to take the risk. We lost money because easyJet wouldn’t repay us, but we played safe. We thought it wasn’t that bad in Britain.” According to government figures, there were 1,302 confirmed cases of Covid across the UK by 11 March; data from the Office for National Statistics later revealed that there had been 26 Covid deaths.

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Outrage after Venezuelan racehorse stolen and butchered

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Horse owners say theft is becoming an increasingly common crime in nation where many are going hungry

In his prime, the coffee-hued Venezuelan racehorse known as Ocean Bay thundered down tracks and snatched up the nation’s most prestigious titles.

His end this week has outraged many: the stallion was stolen and butchered in what horse owners say it becoming an increasingly common crime in a nation where many are going hungry amid a severe economic contraction.

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