Te Akau Friday Update

David writes:

Congratulations to Jamie Richards on a fantastic start to his training career.  Ten runners for five wins - what a strike rate!

Good luck to our three runners at Hawkes Bay tomorrow.  Jamie has two top mares in Group 1 Tarzino tomorrow plus Te Akau Shark is having his first start for nine months.  And of course King Kane resumes at Ruakaka for former NZ Cricket captain Brendon McCullum and his Vermair team!

On Tuesday Mark Walker went to Matamata to take in the track work and then he, our veterinary surgeon Dr Doug Black and his colleague Ronan Costello and Jamie inspected every horse in the stable.

The big news this week was the release of the John Messara Report on the Racing and Breeding industry and while I might not support everything in it, 95% is pure common sense.

Isn't it refreshing to have a government that understands the importance of our great industry and is going to support it?

Previous governments have just had the 'take, take, take' from our industry mentality and have given nothing back, whereas our current Minister for Racing understands how important we are to this country's economy, and not just from an employment perspective, but also in terms of export revenue.

The comparison with Australia is that their Governments fully understand the value of racing and there is hardly a week that goes by without an announcement of support.

Now some people will say ‘why can't racing stand on its own two feet?' I say if the NZ Rugby Union can get $38 million for the World Cup, the America's Cup can get $35 million, the Michael Hill Gold Tournament $3 million - these are all good spends in my opinion but racing needs to be on an even platform - you can't GIVE to boat races and TAKE, TAKE , TAKE from racing and breeding.

The most significant thing to come out of last night is that within, say the next 18 months, stakes are going to double.  In the last three season Te Akau owners have won stakes of over $8.6 million in New Zealand alone - so if you double that, you will see a lot of additional money going back to owners.

The good news is we will have three all-weather tracks - once we have the all-weather tracks we can then start to close some racetracks down and that is where you see further cost savings and efficiencies. So yes it is an exciting time to be investing in this great industry.

The last week of August is always a very frustrating time of the year - most days it rains and you have to feel sorry for the wonderful people who look after all the horses. But hey tomorrow is the start of Spring and in no time it warms up and the tracks get firmer and we are all back in business.

At Te Akau Stud the days are getting longer and the grass is growing.  We are nearly half way through the docking and the percentages of lambs is the best ever.

About ten years ago one of my best friends and the best farmer in New Zealand, Peter Grieve, told me ‘David in my life time we will at some stage get $2,000 for a fat steer, and $200 for a finished lamb'.  At the time I thought he was dreaming because a good price then was $1,100 for a steer and $80 for a lamb.  I have already sold steers for $2,000 and the first nine pens of lambs killed last week all made over $200.  So as usual - Peter Grieve was correct.

I was over the moon to see our three Te Akau runners record three wins at Ashburton yesterday.  Can I also say - well done to Robert and Donna who have shares in all three of our winners yesterday, and also to Glenn and Cathie and John and Denise who had two runners for two wins.

I got a big thrill out of seeing Nic Bakar wins his second race in the tangerine from only three rides and have you noticed how well Shafiq Rusof (Suppy) is riding.? I don't think anybody in New Zealand is riding better than him at present.  He has two great attributes.  Firstly he has a great set of hands which means the horses relax beautifully and secondly he is very strong in a finish and he can use the whip in both hands which is a huge advantage.

Today we are having a strategy meeting at Te Akau Stud.  We enjoy putting all aspects of our business under the microscope as we aim to be the very best at everything we do.

Go the Tangerine and have a great weekend plus I will be having a drink to celebrate Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters - isn't it great to have someone who understands racing?