Cover image courtesy of The Image Is Everything
As the first Tuesday of November looms over the horizon, the industry-wide conversation hones in even more on the G1 Melbourne Cup and its place in generating revenue for Racing Victoria. In the 2023/24 financial year, the Racing Victoria Limited Group (RVLG) reported that 67.9% of the state’s total revenue came from wagering - equating to an income share of $364.4 million - and that intake was precarious enough.
Wagering income technically increased from the previous financial year, but only a favourable settlement when exiting the expiring Victorian Wagering Licence and VICTAB Joint Venture saved that figure from being hit by the statewide reduction in wagering turnover.
Despite wagering revenue to Racing Victoria increasing 1% year on year, Racing Victoria’s Annual Report divulges the total drop in wagering turnover statewide as a steep 10.2%. After another year where Racing Victoria has had to reshuffle prizemoney in an effort to stabilise returns to owners, any hit to wagering has huge repercussions and no principal racing authority can rest on their laurels with the knowledge of such a statewide decline.
Form analyst Nic Ashman has one radical proposal in the hopes of stabilising wagering revenue going forward; dodge the Australian Football League - racing's biggest wagering threat, uproot tradition, and move the spring carnival back by four weeks. Yes, all of it.
The industry must adapt
What Ashman believes is the biggest challenge in maximising turnover is the carnival’s overlap with the AFL, with the grand final of the latter occupying the last weekend in September. On a weekend where they could be tuning in to the G1 Golden Rose Stakes, people’s minds were instead elsewhere on the football.
Nic Ashman | Image courtesy of Victoria Racing Club
“The industry is heading in two directions at the moment,” Ashman said. “We need to decide, are we content with where we are and ceding some of our turnover on spring majors to the AFL, or do we acknowledge that the world’s changed? Sports betting is on the rise, and we will get left behind if we don’t change. We will only shrink if we don’t adapt.”
“Are we content with where we are and ceding some of our turnover on spring majors to the AFL, or do we acknowledge that the world’s changed?” - Nic Ashman
Ashman’s thesis is simple; by moving everything in the spring back, racing has one less great competitor. The G1 Moir Stakes no longer competes with the second stage of quarter finals, and the G1 Makybe Diva Stakes a week later dodges the semi finals altogether. Football is done and dusted before the carnival has gathered full momentum, and people's eyes - and their TAB accounts - are back on the race track.
Ashman has witnessed a rise in sports betting and can’t see growth in the area doing anything but continuing. He predicts a continued decline in racing wagering, if the industry doesn’t do something fast.
“The industry is still coming down from the sugar-rush of COVID betting, and it is the responsibility of the VRC to work out how to best sustain racing,” he said. As has been witnessed in New South Wales, racing’s wagering revenue post-pandemic has dropped, and has currently settled just about pre-pandemic levels.
“If that means cutting prizemoney, so be it, but also if the best option to save wagering income and to sustain what we have in racing at the moment is to move the Melbourne Cup, it is Racing Victoria’s responsibility to give that serious consideration.”
“If the best option to save wagering income and to sustain what we have in racing at the moment is to move the Melbourne Cup, it is Racing Victoria’s responsibility to give that serious consideration.” - Nic Ashman
All roads lead to the Melbourne Cup, as Ashman sees it, at least in terms of wagering. Breaking from tradition would be a sizeable ask of Victorian racing, but pushing the race from its historic Tuesday could negate the slow start to spring wagering that Ashman has identified.
Messing with the calendar
Mick Price cut straight to the heart of the matter; if you move one carnival around, what on earth happens to the rest of racing?
“It’s a ridiculous idea,” he said. “What about the autumn? If you compete in the spring, it’s already a quick turnaround to the autumn carnival, and then (moving the spring) would push into summer racing and we would be running on firmer tracks. I’m not in favour of it at all.”
“It's a ridiculous idea.” - Mick Price
Something that could potentially fall at the wayside, if the spring carnival was delayed or even abbreviated, is that we could see a reduction in field quality late in the spring, with trainers opting to save their top horses for the autumn. It would take Champions Day to the beginning of December, where last year’s G1 MacKinnon Stakes winner Via Sistina (Ire) (Fastnet Rock) had long gone to the paddock.
Mick Price | Image courtesy of The Image Is Everything
The alternative would be that she misses the start of the spring and would have to launch straight into Group 1 company. Neither sound enticing to Price.
Price also remained unconvinced that the dent in racing wagering is really reflective of what is happening in sports betting. Merely dodging one sports event isn’t the answer.
“I’m not sure sports betting is really impacting on racing wagering as much as some think,” he said. There’s other avenues of distraction for potential punters. “People are wagering away from racing because the younger demographic is entertained by more than just ‘boring old racing’.
“People are wagering away from racing because the younger demographic is entertained by more than just ‘boring old racing’.” - Mick Price
“That's the problem. It’s not like the old days where there was racing, cricket, and football, the punting demographic has that much more to bet on now that it’s not even funny.”
How can racing compete? One thing that Price is sure on is that giving up on the programming and bending to the whims of another sport is not the answer.
Give football the punt
Rob Waterhouse has a different view on restructuring the spring.
“It’s an interesting idea,” he said, when hearing the proposal to push racing back by a month. The sticking point for him was the concern that until the football finishes, whenever that date may be, it’s hard to shift the conversation back to racing.
“I think there is a crossover (in people watching both football and racing), but I think you would really have to go back six months in time if you want people to stop watching the AFL. If you want to avoid clashing with the AFL, I don’t think four weeks is enough.”
“If you want to avoid clashing with the AFL, I don’t think four weeks is enough.” - Rob Waterhouse
Instead, Waterhouse would rather address the calendar position of the AFL, and instead move football’s season to culminate at the beginning of September, as opposed to the end. The AFL grand final was run on the first Saturday of September in 2000, so as to not clash with the Sydney Olympics, and Waterhouse doesn't see it as too difficult to make the date change permanent.
Rob Waterhouse | Image courtesy of Rob Waterhouse
“Football is a winter sport,” he reasoned. “It should be done by the beginning of September. Everybody in Melbourne talks AFL until the grand finale, then the conversation shifts back to racing.”
Waterhouse also advocated for better collaboration between Racing Victoria and Racing New South Wales to build a proper spring pattern that benefits both jurisdictions.
“With less competing races, you could have the best horses racing against one another in both states, but it needs someone with great charm to bring them (the states) both together.” - Rob Waterhouse
“It’s a shame there’s not currently peace between Racing Victoria and New South Wales,” he said. “With less competing races, you could have the best horses racing against one another in both states, but it needs someone with great charm to bring them (the states) both together. I understand that John Kanga gets on very well with Peter V’Landys, it’s a great shame that he isn’t in a position to be a peacekeeper and negotiator between the two states.”
Build a bigger, better carnival
For Anthony Del Monaco, turfdeli.com.au’s form analyst, trying to dodge the AFL is a pointless endeavour. The opportunity lies in other parts of the carnival to make up any wagering lost in September.
“The spring racing carnival has been a major event on the calendar for generations, and it continues to provide enticing spectacles year after year,” he said. “Racing needs to have confidence in its product. It can’t be running scared because another sport has grown in popularity and market share. It has to be able to grow and match it with its own selling points.
“(Racing) can’t be running scared because another sport has grown in popularity and market share.” - Anthony Del Monaco
“And the spring racing carnival, as it is, is a massive selling point. The tradition of the Caulfield Cup to Cox Plate to Melbourne Cup is really entrenched in the calendar. That sense of occasion is racing’s greatest draw at this time of the year.”
Del Monaco was keen to point out that the Melbourne Cup achieved its largest crowd since before the pandemic in 2024, and the 2024 G1 Caulfield Cup featured a capacity crowd for the first time since 2018, despite sharing its date with the G1 The Everest in Sydney.
It is actually the blueprint of the Everest that Del Monaco could see applied in Victoria as well - record crowds descended on Randwick to watch Ka Ying Rising (NZ) (Shamexpress {NZ}) cement his world’s greatest sprinter title in the $20 million event, and Racing NSW’s aggressive marketing strategies saw that crowd full of racegoers under the age of 26. The Everest’s inclusion in the World Pool saw wagering skyrocket - in no small part due to Hong Kong’s belief in their champion.
The $1 million The Meteorite, which runs on November 22 this year, could be joined by other invitational or special conditions races, the likes of which have proven so successful over the border.
“There is plenty of opportunity for racing in Victoria to create and develop new events and products in mid to late November to capture that space in the calendar, without detracting from the existing and proven race program,” Del Monaco said. “There’s space there to grow crowds without denigrating the rest of the spring carnival.”
“There is plenty of opportunity for racing in Victoria to create and develop new events and products in mid to late November to capture that space in the calendar.” - Anthony Del Monaco
Instead of worrying about AFL’s effect on wagering, Del Monaco foresees the chance to make up for those possible losses with supplementary events. Racing needs to invite people in, without contorting themselves into an unrecognisable shape. Build it and they will come - without relegating the race that stops the nation to December.
The odds of Victoria shifting the Melbourne Cup are longer than Knight’s Choice’s were last year - but at least the debate’s worth the punt. Racing could use a few more bold ideas and fewer safe bets.
