First Owners for Owners blog - A Cup Half Full

Welcome to the first blog of Owners for Owners.  Many of them will be written by Jon Hughes, but other owners will be making guest appearances, including the acerbic views of The Curmudgeon commenting on all the things that go wrong in racing. The blog is on 1st and 15th of each month.

A Cup Half Full

There is certainly no shortage of challenges and self-inflicted wounds in horseracing.  Persistently weak leadership in the BHA;  a serious funding crisis;  inept handling of the Tote sale;  a surfeit of low-grade racing;  a customer experience at many tracks that remains lamentable despite the efforts of Racing for Change (or as The Curmudgeon calls it, “Racing for Small Change”);  narrow-minded and non-collaborative factions trying to beat three bells out of each other all the time, rather than working together for the good of racing;  and a declining breeding, training and owning industry as a result of austerity and recession so lots of subjects to air on the blog.

And yet racing also remains capable of stirring passion, pleasure and total absorption.  It is a marvellous sport.  As a friend recently commented about owning horses:  “It is definitely an addiction and there is no known cure.”  Thank goodness!  Throughout the blog, though, we will be looking at the positives and not just the negatives.  In our modest way we intend to suggest some recommendations for action that might improve the industry and the experience of racing.  Yes, it is a cup half full, not half empty.