We have been told that the new financial controller is going about the business of revamping the accounting processes at Caymanas Track Limited (CTL) with some amount of robustness and alacrity.

If this had happened over the last years, the promoting company might never be experiencing the blight it is currently undergoing.

The need to cut costs is self-evident. Any leakage in the system cannot be tolerated as the result of any form of mismanagement will rebound negatively on employees and the many and varied stakeholders in the racing industry. We applaud the work of new financial controller ‘The Prince’ and urge him to continue in his crusade for change, which hopefully will lead to a modern accounting system working with the norms of acceptable standards.

One therefore can partially understand the message we saw when the CTL website was accessed and a click made on the past performance button. The following posting was seen — “Past Performances has been suspended temporarily until further notice. Sorry for any inconvenience caused.” To this writer the posted explanation is a clear sign that the exclusion of the past performance lines is part of the cost cutting exercise now being undertaken by the company. It is a thin line, but the following should be taken into consideration.

It is not known whether ‘The Prince’ is aware that the majority of persons who support racing do not come to the racetrack, and their access to racing is limited to the official racebook, at a relatively expensive cost and the CTL website — caymanasracetrack.com, moreso the latter with its postings of the overnight programme and the past performance notes. Many punters head for their computers by 7:00 pm on Wednesdays and Saturdays to check the overnight and then patiently wait for the posting of the past performance lines to begin their assessment of the upcoming race programme, which more often than not leads to the placing of bets at the OTBs or the betting shops.

A strong request is made for a re-evaluation of the decision to exclude the past performance lines from the CTL website. It can lead to disillusionment certainly among non-racetrack punters and for those who travel aboard and want to keep up with the happenings at the track. The decision to exclude the popular PP lines will negate from the progress made in recent times on the CTL website. The posting of full results plus the video of all races at the end of the raceday is a whopping achievement which is fully embraced by all. Now to take off the PP is a truly retrograde step which can harm in the long run.

It is understood that changes are inevitable, but changes as much as it humanly possible must not be done to harm the racing product. The exclusion of the PP is without doubt a non-racing decision and should be reversed. ‘The Prince’ is not known as a racing man, that is, having a racing background, this why those in racing who have his ears should quickly explain why the past performance lines are indispensable to the racing product.