pandemic | Horse Racing Free Tips

Waiting For A Cool Down In A Hot Horse Market?

The horse market, like the housing market, has been wild lately, with horses being bought sight unseen for thousands more than the asking price. Many sellers can't keep enough equine inventory to satisfy the current need.

It's been nearly two decades since amateur rider Tracy Gould horse shopped, she wrote in a recent column for the Chronicle of the Horse. In the 2000s, it wasn't unusual for horses to go out on two-week trials or to find a plethora of horses for sale under $5,000 – specifically retired racehorses.

Now, green horses –including OTTBs — are being sold without trials and horses are selling on social media platforms within days of being posted. Gold writes she doesn't need anything fancy, but she does want a horse that could do a little bit of everything, especially as her daughter grows up and hopefully begins riding. She's reluctant to buy anything without the ability to test ride and see if they “click.”

Gold hypothesizes that the horse market is being driven by the meteoric rise in people taking riding lessons since the COVID-19 pandemic hit: kids began taking riding lessons as their team sports and indoor activities were cancelled, and it's easy to social distance while riding outside. Additionally, the stock market is booming, allowing even non-wealthy families the ability to afford horses, and many people are either working remotely or have moved away from the city, allowing them more access to horses and lessons.

As people return to in-person work schedules and schools, Gold wonders if it's possible the market may cool off. Still, most people in the business of selling OTTBs will tell you that day hasn't arrived yet.

Read more at the Chronicle of the Horse.

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Can Horses Help Overcome Pandemic-Related Social Anxiety?

Life coach and leadership expert Stacey Warner uses horses to help teach people about themselves and how they interact with others. With COVID-19 restrictions lifting in many parts of the country, Warner sees her classes as even more relatable as people come out of isolation and are learning how to interact with the world once again.

Warner's classes are dubbed “Horse Powered Leadership” and they focus on encouraging team harmony in a corporate setting. The classes are designed to teach attendees something about themselves, how they work with others and how teams work together, the Courier Journal reports.

A California transplant, Warner says classes utilizing horses in this teaching capacity are very common in California and Arizona. Horses offer clear feedback to class attendees in a way not often seen in a work-related setting. Understanding social cues is a skill that has gone mostly unneeded as many people have worked remotely for over a year.

Warner teaches several different types of classes, but the end goal of each is the same: to let the horse expose the attendee's strengths and weaknesses, then to use that knowledge to become more productive.

Women Jockeys’ World Cup Cancelled For Second Year

The Women Jockey's World Cup has been cancelled for the second year running due to continuing COVID-19 pandemic restrictions. Started at Bro Park in Stockholm, Sweden in 2017, the event is traditionally staged in June and has seen riders from 12 countries compete during the first three editions.

Dennis Madsen Svensk Galopp's Director of Racing said, “It is very frustrating to have to cancel the Women Jockeys' World Cup for a second year running.

“The international nature of the event requires early planning and even with the concessions that are made for international sports, uncertainty around quarantine rules for jockeys returning home from Sweden forced our decision.

“We remain committed to creating high profile opportunities for top female riders and hope to return the event in 2022. Racing in Sweden continues to grow in popularity, and we recently announced a record entry for the Swedish Derby and Oaks series. The Women Jockeys' World Cup is our most popular international event and we look forward to reinstating it at the earliest opportunity.”

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£3 Million Plus Prize Money Boost at The Jockey Club Racecourses

A prize money boost of over £3 million at The Jockey Club racecourses for the remainder of 2021 was announced on Tuesday.

This purse increase brings prize money to within 9% of pre-pandemic levels. Total prize money will exceed £42 million this year at all levels of the sport for the 15 racecourses operated by The Jockey Club. This amount is prior to additional funding from the industry's Appearance Money Scheme (AMS). These prize money increases are effective immediately, with the Cazoo Derby Festival gaining £65,000 and a £135,000 boost to Coral-Eclipse Day.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, The Jockey Club distributed only £30.5 million in prize money and racing was halted from mid-March until June. As The Jockey Club generates nearly 50% of its revenues from spectators and another 10% by staging conferences and similar types of events and neither of these were possible during the COVID-19 pandemic, The Jockey Club sustained an overall loss of £90 million. This trend continues into 2021. Pre-covid, The Jockey Club managed to increase its contribution to prize money by over 103% in the last decade to £26.4 million.

“One of our imperatives since the start of the pandemic has been to keep prize money values under constant review,” said The Jockey Club Chief Executive Nevin Truesdale. “The financial impact of coronavirus has been very significant indeed and it will take some time yet to recover. However, with some positive indicators around funding and with spectators starting to return, albeit in heavily restricted numbers at this point, we wanted to move quickly to announce this prize money increase.

“The biggest issue aside from losing so much of our revenue has been the constant uncertainty. If you could guarantee after the second lockdown that things would return permanently to normal, we would have been able to plan investments accordingly, but here we are well over a year into the pandemic and we are only just starting to welcome some racegoers back. Therefore, we continue to have to play the situation as it comes and ensure we would remain solvent if another lockdown occurred.

“I'd like to thank participants for the huge amount of patience they've shown and reassure them that The Jockey Club always treats prize money as an absolute priority, as I hope our track record and this announcement leaves no doubt about. We aim to get our prize money contributions fully back to pre-pandemic levels as soon as we realistically can.”

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