RACING A BUSINESS?

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1144, 14 March 1912, Page 7

RACING A BUSINESS?

There are some owners who are of opinion that they should please selves, and not the public, in the mat-

ter of how they run their horses, but. though a sentiment of this kind is excusable from a “battler,” who has only the turf to look to for his bread and butter, something better is expected from men who are in a position to race for love of the sport. It is a peculiar fact, says an exchange,, that many who are above suspicion in their own particular line of business, have a weakness to indulge in what thjey believe to be “cleverness” when, they identify themselves with hors© racing. Any other hobby jthey are prepared to pay for, but this particular one they expect to return more than they expend on it, and consequently let the monetary side take precedence of everything else. T THE INTERESTS OF SPORT. In commenting on this subject ( the “Otago Witness” contends tha-t the ownership of racehorses should mean something more than the mere consideration of personal gain. They should be run in the interest of sport,, and not regardless of th/e fact that the public dearly loves to see really good ones meet one another. The oftrepeated statement! that the public does not pay the training bills, and has therefore no right to be studied, is not only unwonthy, but not strictly tru,e, for the public does, in fact, contribute very largely to the maintenance of horses in training. If there

were no gate money owners would have to depend on themselves only for stakes. Moreover, we live in days when the purely selfish ownership, even of racehorses, cannot be successfully defended. Rignts without duties are inadmissible, and the real danger to the turf is that owners should disregard this ('truth, and treat racing as a money-making pursuit, and nothing more. A DUTY TO SPORT. Let them fully recognise that if they have the right, by virtue of their haying sufficient means to run their horses in public, it is their duty, so far as is reasonably possible, to study th;e interests of £port and give the public a good show. Nor should they ever forget that the ultimate justification of racing is that it tends to the improvement of cur breed of horses, the racecourse test affording the one sure method of finding out what animals are really the most worthy to perpetuate the species. It is neither good sport or policy to shirk and evade this test simply because money can be made more easily in another direction; and it is to be hoped that owners will give some serious consideration to this, for the enemy is always at our gates, and th e cause of sport cannot be defended by mere commercialism.