Popular racehorse owner ACK Stables believes there is grounds on which promoting company Supreme Ventures Racing and Entertainment Limited (SVREL) and horsemen, owners in particular, can form a solid relationship if the right steps are taken.

The remarks follow a series of negotiations in which horsemen rejected SVREL’s proposed $27-million purse increase, considering it as insufficient, and later withheld nominations, resulting in the July 15 and 16 race day cancellations.

However, ACK Stables pointed out that there are better ways to handle the matter that do not involve shutting down racing, especially given that owners like himself stand to lose more as a result of such a result.

“There are many different ways of doing things without locking down racing. Find the truth and show the people and then put everything to purse and it will work going forward,” ACK Stables told the Jamaica Observer’s The Supreme Racing Guide.

According to research conducted by The Supreme Racing Guide of the Jamaica Observer, breeders receive 9% of the designated purse money after selling their horses outright and having them race and win, while trainers receive 15% of the purse money while other get 10 per cent in other countries.

In that line, ACK Stables proposed that the funds awarded to breeders, as well as five percent from the trainers amount, could be redirected to the purse, to help smooth things out with the promoting business.

This is because ACK Stables argued that because breeders had already sold the horses to other parties, they should have no claim to the horses’ winnings, whereas trainers in Jamaica have been entitled to 15 per cent of the purse, rather than the 10 per cent that other trainers receive elsewhere in the world.

“You breed a horse, and you sell it outright, and at the end of it, every time the horse wins, the breeder gets nine per cent of the purse. That was done temporarily, but it has remained in place up until now but the breeders need to give up that nine percent and the owners will benefit from that. From there now, you can negotiate in another six months or so if you think something is not right.

“But for now, the need to look at the serious factor because breeders sell their horses and it’s like they still own a piece of those horses and it doesn’t cost them anything. If you go anywhere in the world, trainers get 10 percent and breeders get nothing unless it is a special race. So if you want to go first world then you have to go that way because the nine percent was initially supposed to be temporary,” ACK Stables argued.

“All over the world trainers get 10 percent of the purse, so why are we giving them 15 percent. So if you take the nine percent breeders share and the extra five percent that the trainers are getting, it would amount to 14 percent increase on the owners’ money. And that would be in addition to whatever the promoting company offers,” last year’s winning Mouttet Mile owner added.

Patrick Smellie, president of the United Racehorse Trainers’ Association of Jamaica (UTRAJ) and a thoroughbred horse breeder, believes that while ACK Stakes’ suggestion for breeders to give up the nine of purse money received from selling their horses outright was reasonable, he believes that not everyone would agree with the point.

“Let’s say the breeder spent $700,000 on a farm, and if your horse sells for $1 million, you’ve gotten your money back plus some profit, so that’s one off. If you breed again the next year, that horse may sell for $2 million, and you will have earned a profit, but the horse has not gone on to be any good enough to win a Classic, so you will not receive a suitable proportion.

“So, most of the horses that come to the sales, when they sell for an average of, say, $700,000, you barely get back what you spent, and sometimes you don’t get back what you spent. So you [the breeders] look forward to that proportion if that [horse] becomes a Classic horse and you earn a reasonable return on your investment. That is a wonderful notion from that owner, but I am not sure many breeders would agree, but it is well worth looking into,” Smellie added.

However, Smellie acknowledged it would be difficult for the trainers to give up five per cent of the amount the receive.

“Eighty percent of our costs here are in US dollars. The only things that aren’t included in US dollars are water and grass, which is why we only get 15 per cent of the available funds. Everywhere else in the globe, bringing a horse to the wicket is a little less expensive.

“Remember, ours is determined by US dollars, and the value of US dollars has fluctuated so much over the last 20 years that it’s not funny, and thus we couldn’t get a lower percentage at all.” It was too expensive; inflation in Jamaica and escalating costs could never bring us below that proportion,” Smellie reasoned.