In my previous column I promised to make certain recommendations to improve the performance of Supreme Ventures Racing & Entertainment Limited (SVREL) and therefore advance the status of the stakeholders, attract more interest in wagering, investment in the breeding industry, and improve the economic viability of this promoting company by an enhancement of the racing product.

Having undertaken this effort, I imagine there is going to be the obvious and legitimate question as to whether, or otherwise, I have the expertise to offer this advice. However, this submission is being presented on a platform of historical facts and data-based analyses of the performance of the local racing industry spanning the 66-plus years of the Caymanas operations.

Truth be told, the board of directors of the Jamaica Racing Commission(JRC) and the then-promoting company, Caymanas Track Limited(CTL), were duped by conspiracy theorists into believing, despite evidence to the contrary, that a handicap system racing product model growing at a rate of 10 per cent year over year or cumulatively 300 per cent for over three decades, was corrupt.

These board members were also sold on the notion that owning and trading in thoroughbreds could be a viable economic activity. This was an equally defective and flawed premise as a racehorse is not a business asset, it is no more than an expensive pet. Profitability was not possible then, and no more likely now, 33 years on. In fact, the industry faces an existential threat.

Under the claiming system, matters came to a head with losses of $149 million in 2012, followed by $98 million in 2013. This was unsustainable at the then rate of foreign exchange and, therefore, attracted the interest of the International Monetary Fund to promptly demand divestment of the Government-owned loss-making promoting company. By 2017, the previously sustained average of over 600 owners declined to 314. The breeding sheds, with a capacity of over 400 foals fell sharply to under 300, with the brood mare stock of over 800 a decade ago falling to under 400.

As I have indicated in this space already, a promoting company offers two types of wagers. If a bet is not for place, it is for single win or win in the 12-option exotic wagers. Therefore, races with odds-on favourites underperform as sales units. This is simply because a horse race does not present a perception or a profile of a lottery type 100 per cent game of chance with confident predictions of the likely outcome.

In my view, since 1993, neither the JRC nor the two promoting companies, CTL and SVREL, has engaged any operative who has a grasp of the real importance of handicapping methodology to ensure that inferior horses do not concede weight to superior ones, creating odds-on favourites in nearly 50 per cent of races. In the first three years 2017-20, the 2,229 races promoted by SVREL had 1,099 odd-on favourites. Also, of the 1,509 races for 2024-25, there were 755 of these short-priced favourites discouraging rather than driving wagering.

In 2023, there were 855 races over 84 race days, but in 2024 and 2025, the projections offered 755 and 754 races, respectively, with each offering a calendar of 80 programmes. The recommendation I will make here is based on the certainty that the number of races in 2026 can exceed that of each of the last two years, with a reduction in days, but with as many as 12 on races in each programme going forward.

Classification will ensure enough nominations for divided races in the bottom three classes on each race day. With classification reducing the number of categories/classes to seven instead of the prevailing 19, along with claiming tags valuation of each horse in the varied cohort of the approximately near 800-strong horse population, the 2025 calendar should be adjusted as shown here. The scheduling of all Saturdays and one Sunday each month, even in a week when one of the seven available Public Holidays falls, for a total of 70 days, which is 10 meets fewer than last season’s 80 to stage at least 840 races.

If this is implemented, the combination of (a) larger field sizes, (b) a simplification of the racing product through classification to drive wagering, (c) a betting option to expand the market by attracting female bettors, (d) fewer race days with more races to reduce operating expenses, and (e) a significant increase in appearance fees as an incentive for owners, will. At the very least, put the promoting company on a path to viability.

It is time for stakeholders, the Thoroughbred Owners & Breeders Association, and the United Racehorse Trainers Association of Jamaica to realise that with over three decades of negative Financial Statements annually that, the complex claiming system racing product has only discouraged growth in the market and, therefore, is immune to profitability.

In the next column I will be analysing the critical deliverables and the shortfalls in the 2017 Divestment Agreement, six weeks away from the ninth anniversary of when it became operational in March of that year.