Goodwill gesture from GC 8-)

Gold Circle and Phumelela have agreed to plough back the gross Win pool from yesterday's 6th race at Clairwood as a gesture of goodwill to punters.



The pool of R120 000 will be added to the Win pool for the Easter Handicap at Clairwood on Sunday, 31 March 2013.



In terms of their Totalisator licences, the Racing Operators are bound by the rules of the National Horseracing Authority (NHA) and are obliged to pay dividends based on the official and "all clear" result as declared by the NHA.


ends

is this a guilt admission?

who the fcuk does this help?the punters who lost their money in cold blood ?no it doesnt ...the owners and connections of the 9th race who has had their race scrapped and not put on next week NO it doesnt ...it just gets worse

Better than nothing though.

Thanks Hibs, I wonder if any action will be taken against the starter. Would rather have him fined the R120,000 to go pool.

I will see the head starter later and let you know.

are they ganna take their 25% cut from this R120k as well?

who was the most senior g.circle official on course yday?was any director on duty?

I had some small doubles running with the fav yesterday in the race so after watching the replay really sour that the race was not scrapped.

the horse had no chance once the gates never opened.

My PA payout never covered my outlay

A total disgrace.

Just turned to page 13 of todays daily news...the picture says it all:

Not good enough!! Understandably the result has to stand and Gold Circle needs to play by the rules. BUT, what rule is in place that dictates to Gold Circle that they cannot refund all losing bets involving the effected horse whilst the result still stands? This is a public relations nightmare and it's probably safe to say that there's going to be loss of turnover whilst sour punters are baying for blood.. and that's just the start of it. The waves from this decision are not going to just disappear overnight. Gold Circle needs to pay out refunds (or in the case of exotics, partial refunds) to all tickets that have this horse finishing anywhere other than 3rd. That's pick6, jackpot, all-to-comes, doubles, wins, exactas, trifectas, quartets etc. suck it up and pay, there’s no other option. And even then, it doesn’t completely suture the wound because there’s an international audience betting on our racing, within their own jurisdictions. Who will refund them? Who is going to want to bet on SA horse racing ever again since this bizarre NHRA rule has been exposed to shaft punters whilst bending for owners? This is highly damaging to the credibility of racing, especially as a betting sport. What does the high roller in Hong Kong or wherever think when he puts his pound of flesh down on the odds on favourite good thing in the feature race, and then loses everything because the gate fails to open. This is really bad in terms of the facts, but what about the speculation? No doubt punters are going to be concocting conspiracy theories about how the gate was purposely not opened so the favourite would lose. It will be interesting to find out what the rulebooks of other racing countries would allow for should this have happened in their backyard. And it comes in just off the heels of the recent Barry Irwin saga too! We just keep stumbling from one embarrassment to the next and it's all happening on the international stage, this is not the 60s anymore.

Oh what a circus, oh what a show :

Having read through most of the responses to this debacle, imo the wrong decision was made and the race should have been declared null and void from a punting prospective, yet the owners should still have received the stake cheques - now why is that so difficult to arrive at a decision that would have satisfied most (if not all)?