BY WES MARTIN

The 88 race days in 2022 yielded 856 races, the 2023 calendar had 84 with 802, and 2024’s 88 days offered 755. This represents a decrease of 101 over a period of three years and suggests that, instead of a gradual reduction, there is now a more dramatic decline in the number of horses available for programming. The bloodstock, including importation to replenish the horse population at viable levels, will not be possible with the prevailing, unviable, claiming system as constituted.

By the way, no one should get excited over the 120 nominations and 116 declarations for the racecard of August 30, 2025. The fact of the matter is that 61 of these are five-year-olds and upwards. Most are infrequent starters beset with sundry problems anyway. Be reminded that as of January 1, 2026 these will be six-year-olds and upwards, hopefully able to continue their respective, oft-interrupted, careers in order to help in the ongoing crisis..

The fact of the matter is that claiming was established on two false premises: (a) a racing product that grew 300 per cent cumulatively in three decades lacked integrity, and (b) the trading of thoroughbred horses had prospects of being a viable economic activity.

This, with fatal consequences, became the reality of the industry. Sold on these flawed notions, there has been the disappearance of many high rollers who learnt expensive and unproductive financial lessons. Importantly, the breeding industry has been a major casualty of claiming.

The readers may find this two-decade effort incredible, but it is provable. This writer has engaged, by invitation, with the following outstanding and knowledgeable administrators: JRC chairmen Rudolph Muir, Anthony Shoucair, and Clovis Metcalfe. CTL board chairmen Howard Hamilton, P H O Rousseau (deceased), Raphael Gordon, Anthony Hart (dec), and Christopher Brown, as well as SVREL’s Michael Bernard. Incidentally, CTL general managers Freddie Jobson, Hugh Blake, and Cedic Stewart were also included, and eventually, with Solomon Sharpe, now the executive chairman of SVREL.

What do all these men have in common? When presented with the data-based analyses of the underperformance of the programmes delivered in a claiming system, their collective conclusion was that it is flawed in all respects and unviable as a gaming product. The problem, though, is that the stakeholders through ignorance, wilful or otherwise, would not be swayed.

Given the structure of the industry, despite their personal conviction, none of these very concerned administrators could take action unilaterally. Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association (TOBA) and United Racehorse Trainers Association of Jamaica (URTAJ) representatives are solely responsible for this outcome. The Government of Jamaica expended US$40 million to keep CTL operational until IMF-mandated divestment. SVREL has reported a $400-million shortfall in its projected 2024 revenue.

Effectively, for the eight years of operation from 2017, SVL/SVREL has been literally forced by the stakeholders to work with an economically unviable claiming system. Profitability and claiming systems are mutually exclusive, as the USA, Canada, Trinidad & Tobago, Panama, and Puerto Rico, etc will verify, But unfortunately, this is where we are.

One hopes that this statistical proof of an existential threat to local racing will elicit the appropriate response from the TOBA and URTAJ stakeholders. Between them, for over 33 years they have been immune to the data-based analysis of the unwholesome claiming system racing product. This writer finds it extraordinary that there has been no attention, or feedback that matters, given to this column which has been publishing the uncontestable facts for over a decade. Next, the business model of SVL/SVREL and more statistics to come. Watch this space.