Every so often something pops up in the media that really makes us think. The linked article which appeared in the Thoroughbred Daily News on 4 July was written by New Zealand – bred Vicki Leonard and deals with the falling interest in racing over the ditch. But you have to wonder whether her findings are equally applicable to Godzone.
One observation that occurred to me recently as I was stuck on the couch diligently following instructions to deal with the inconvenience of a ruptured tendon was how stunningly boring winter racing appears to be. There’s nothing on mainstream TV or the front page of Stuff and there’s precious little on the racing page of the daily newspaper. Ms Leonard’s key point is that young people don’t do mainstream TV or Stuff or daily newspapers and so that racing enthusiasts of a certain age have no idea how racing is being portrayed to the twenty- and thirty-somethings who constitute the future of our industry. Good point. All I can add to the issue is that racing isn’t being portrayed with any vibrancy to current enthusiasts either.
As far as Australia is concerned, animal rights activists appear to have hijacked social media with a view to pushing their ill-informed agendas. Is this happening here too? I have no idea but it would be really interesting to find out.
However, even assuming that social media is indeed having the effect of turning large numbers of young people off racing, there is something that we can do. If we really love something, whether it’s Whittaker’s chocolate or the best romantic film of all time – Brief Encounter(1945)- or the joy of owning a winner, then we talk about it. Or do we? I reckon that we racing enthusiasts could do a much better job of promoting our love of thoroughbred racing. Just imagine if each of us made a point of speaking to just three racing novices over the next week and explained how much fun racing is and informed them when the next local meeting was scheduled…
Food for thought?
