Cape Dreams News from in and around the Cape
With the exciting Cape Feature racing season underway, Kenilworth Racing is proud to announce the restructuring of stakes levels for both the feature race schedule as well as the all-important regular race programme that sustains horseracing week in and week out
Owners and stakeholders have paid the sport the highest compliment via their unflagging support of local racing during exceptionally challenging circumstances – support of which Kenilworth Racing is extremely grateful. The faith placed in Kenilworth Racing is enabling significant changes to be put into effect over the next few months.
Racing in South Africa was heavily impacted by the national lockdown which led to the temporary shutdown of local operations, this resulted in the exhaustion of the betting income which funds the stakes pot. The impact to the racing value chain of breeders, owners, trainers, jockeys, grooms, operators and all others earning an income from racing was significant.
The Racing Association supported the top-up of stakes by 20% however this relief expires at the end of November 2020 so a longer-term solution needed to be found.
“Stimulating the racing economy in the Western Cape requires a considerable increase in the stakes on offer to encourage sufficient levels of support to allow betting turnover to recover and profitability to return to pre-COVID levels. The priority for the Cape Summer Season is to attract the highest quality horses for features and larger fields to produce the most competitive races, creating more interest for racegoers and more opportunities for punters”, said Kenilworth Racing Chairman, Bradley Ralph.
A carefully balanced proposal was formulated to ensure feature races are attractive enough to entice visiting trainers to make the trip to the Cape, whilst also helping local owners pay the monthly keep and getting their horses out of the Maidens for a quick return.
A local stakes committee with representation from the Racing Association, Kenilworth Racing and independent racing stakeholders was tasked with exploring a more economical way of distributing the stakes increase in the Cape with “in-season” and “out-of-season” levels.
