Other places in the world do night racing spectacularly, but Australian night meetings are a long way behind the benchmark.
Night racing works wonders in Hong Kong and Singapore in terms of participation, though no jurisdiction will ever be able to meet the lofty spectacle of night racing in Dubai.
Racing Victoria last week announced plans to modernise the Victorian racing calendar by extending the night racing season to nine months. It will see four new meetings at Cranbourne throughout May which will commence at the earlier time of 5:30pm and conclude around 8:30pm.
For the 2014-15 season, Victoria will see 36 night meetings split between Cranbourne (20) and Moonee Valley (16), with 33 held on Friday evenings and three on Saturdays.
While credit must be given to Racing Victoria for their attempt to address participation issues, the new plans hardly solve the existing problems.
Over the past few years, Victoria has used Cranbourne and Moonee Valley as venues for night meetings, while Canterbury regularly hosts Friday night meetings in Sydney.
Hong Kong has long had Happy Wednesdays as a tradition, in which crowds gather after work on a Wednesday evening at Happy Valley.
Since 1973, Happy Valley has been the regular destination of professionals to enjoy the atmosphere, a few casual drinks (everyone still has to work the next day) and live music. And there are two main reasons why Happy Wednesdays is so successful Hong Kong.
The first is because Happy Valley is extremely accessible – just a five-minute tram ride from the Central Business District (Central and Wan Chai). With trams buzzing non-stop along the main road, getting to the racecourse and back is never a problem.
Additionally, there is nothing else happening in Hong Kong on a Wednesday evening. Not for the locals at least.
Horse racing is the major sport of Hong Kong and they have specifically positioned racing on a Wednesday night to break up the week, with their other meeting on Sunday.
On these two principles alone, Victoria cannot even remotely expect the same crowds as Happy Valley.
Moonee Valley is only about five kilometres from the city centre but getting there by public transport is difficult. There is no direct train to the course and trams are infrequent. Driving is the easiest way to get to Moonee Valley (where parking facilities are excellent), but very few people who work in the city drive to work.
Cranbourne is much worse. For those unfamiliar with Melbourne’s layout, Cranbourne is the end of the train line. It takes approximately an hour to get from the city centre to Cranbourne and the track is still a 20-minute walk from the station.
Needless to say, very few people working in the city will be commuting down to Cranbourne after work on a Friday evening.
Geographically speaking, Caulfield is by far the most accessible racecourse in Victoria because it is a major transit hub which is used by both V-Line and Metro. The station also happens to be a two-minute walk from the racecourse, but Racing Victoria has signalled no intentions to introduce night racing at Caulfield.
From a scheduling perspective, the question has to be asked as to why Racing Victoria is hell-bent on Friday night racing.
It makes sense for racing to be an after-work wind-down activity, but Australia’s major race day is Saturday. If people are attending the races on Friday night, how likely are they to do the same the following day?
This doesn’t even take into account the fact that Melbourne is the sporting capital of Australia, with AFL, Super Rugby and NRL strongly followed. This means that for three months, horse racing must go head-to-head with the biggest sporting codes in the country, not just in terms of attendances but television viewers too.
Perhaps those three months would be the ideal time to test racing on any night other than Friday?
Seeing as Racing Victoria are supposedly being innovative, why not take a crack at something revolutionary like consistent night racing?
Summer in Victoria is dangerously hot and as we saw over the past few months, meetings around the state had to be moved or rescheduled due to heat concerns. What if we raced exclusively in the evenings for two months during summer?
Standing around on a 40-degree day hurts. It’s not pleasant for the horses and it’s not pleasant for the spectators.
With extended daylight and cool changes expected in the evenings, summer presents an interesting opportunity to host night meetings. This would, however, be an extremely costly exercise involving the installation of floodlights at the relevant racetracks.
It’s good to see Racing Victoria trying something new and experimenting with the racing calendar but they seem pigeonholed in their choice of nights and racecourses.
And we haven’t even mentioned the quality of racing.
Glenn Innes
Guest
Yes but we have to accept the demographic that pays racings way is not really suited to night racing.Most racing fans are male 40 plus and married,Saturday arvo they get some downtime to do their pocket money on the nags but night time is home with the family.
Brad Durrant
Roar Guru
Great article Alfred. I am all for more night racing, especially the idea of Summer Saturday night racing. But as Cameron mentioned earlier its going to be hard to make that cultural change. One problem with Saturday racing (especially during the Sydney Autumn Carnival)is that many horse racing enthusiasts (like myself) either play sport or work during the day. If the first race kicked off at 6-6:30 then you could find more people attending the race track. More than half of our 30-man football squad would be attending the races straight after the game (Our change room discussions are more about the upcoming races on Saturday instead of game day team-tactics) Another problem with Sydney in general is the public transport system and its hard to get to any kind of Sporting event in Sydney. The most accessible track from the CBD would be Randwick and I understand they are in the process of putting in flood lights. I can't talk on behalf of the Melbourne readers but when it comes to Sydney I would love to see a change to night racing, give it a go after the Autumn Carnival and lets see how successful it is.
Brad Durrant
Roar Guru
Love the idea of Summer Saturday Night racing but agree with Cam that its going to be tough making a cultural change. Think of all the older gentlemen you run into at the pubs/clubs on a Saturday afternoon, getting away from their better halves to have an afternoon flutter on the horses. The majority of them will be in bed before the second race on a Saturday night
Phil McGrawhan
Guest
Night racing in this country sure beats the harness and grey meetings though, at least we get some decent pools going, try getting a decent parlay going on your average Harness-Grey night meetings, a half decent parlay can actually have a decent effect on the pools which sucks, it's why I don't bet on the majority of those meetings.
Drew H
Guest
The great hassle with low BM racing isn't the time or place they race, but is that many people think that trainers are not doing well enough in preparing horses and are putting on bad exhibitions. I cannot understand why many good trainers don't get winners at major events. They have keen owners, good facilties, nice care and knowhow. It must be that the good guys (and girls) get belted up by the contemptuous upper echelon. The average good guy trainer and owner are constantly generating exposure of how poor the top really is, and are being stopped every day. They get one good show in, then somehow their fortunes are ruined. The top rung should just step down if they don't want to do it properly. (but nobody knows how to buy them out)
Alfred Chan
Expert
Great comment Ryan. You're definitely onto something with the less is more idea. I too despise Moonee Valley form. I've been a few times and nothing seems to change with each time I go. Equally frustrating as the form is, the food options are even worse!
Alfred Chan
Expert
I'm not familiar with NSW's racing schedule but every couple of weeks in summer, Moonee Valley and Canterbury racing fall on the same Friday night and they manage 15 minute gaps between races and its fantastic!
Alfred Chan
Expert
Uni nights would certainly be interesting! In my years at Uni, I remember there was a club for just about every sport from frisbee golf to go-kart racing. I know there were plenty of students who enjoyed a flutter on the weekend so Uni events at the races would certainly appeal. Especially considering all the big unis are near Flemington/Moonee Valley or Caulfield. Free entry with cheap drinks - Uni students will turn up en masse.
Sammy
Guest
I think your point is right about our night racing will never be as popular as HK or Singapore. Those cities are light on for sporting entertainment….so there isn't else much to do. I think both Cranbourne and MV have done pretty well in trying to innovate and make night racing attractive - e.g. 955 race, entertainment after races, DJ's etc. The "Velodrome" track layout of MV suits the atmosphere of night racing, a little like at Happy Valley. I don't know the stats, but i'd imagine Friday Night is very good for wagering turnover. End of a working week, lots of blokes either sitting at home on couch relaxing flicking between Footy & Racing or at the Pub with a TAB? Syd night racing seem to have dropped off the radar completely? Canterbury didn't seem to work. There has been talk of putting lights up at Randwick to try and attract inner city folks to night meetings and take advantage of the new entertainment facilities. Regardless of where it is the MOST important thing is the quality of transport infrastructure and options to get in and out of a venue pain free
Ryan
Guest
I agree, it lacks innovation; but I also feel like it will never work unless fundamental changes are made. There are a number issues which come to mind with Victoria's night racing; especially in comparison with Hong Kong. The complete saturation of race meetings makes it hard for the night meeting to be something exciting. Meetings on every day in Victoria makes the Friday night just another set of races. If they want to make It more of an event, they will need some sort of break. Say they had no races on Wednesday/Thursday or just initially just Thursday in Victoria leading into the Friday night than you could almost guarantee a bigger turnout, betting turnover etc. This would never happen due to much lost revenue but I think it could be positive impact on weekend racing. Having the 2 major HK meetings is obviously very successful. Less is more? Also, you touched on at the end the quality of racing which most of the time is deplorable. Friday night Moonee valley form is ignored by most, usually benchmarks 58-64 level, with the occasional 70-78; but often very weak fields regardless of grade. No horse is racing its grand final at the events, and its full of tune-ups and horses that failed at higher grade. There is no horses drawing the crowd to the even (which I feel the industry rarely tries to achieve); just drinks and gambling. Both of which can be done far more comfortable locations on a Friday night. Add in the fact I find Moonee valley a terrible betting track (personal opinion) and Cranbourne is so far from me it wouldn't be worth my while, I cant ever vision myself going to Friday night races. I am a fan of less racing in general but I like the idea of consistent night racing, the installation of floodlights at more relevant tracks would be a worthy investment. The racing has to be the show though, not the fact its dark. People wont come because its dark, its not that much of a novelty. Consistent night racing with a significant improvement in quality, less garbage race meetings during the week and having night racing at several venues not one disliked my many (MV) or one so far away its a hassle; all this combined, who knows, it might just work one day.
Drew H
Guest
Night time is for dancing, and day time for racing. (occasionally the trots at night) As I now do not go to church, every Saturday and Sunday should be a race day. When will we have 5 tracks in Sydney or Melbourne? Have they made allocations?
Cameron Rose
Expert
There's no easy solution, but I think Friday works for what it is. They're trying to appeal to the non-racing, Friday drinks after work crowd, so worrying about those backing up the next day isn't really a concern. They should also be applauded for at least trying something with Cranbourne. It's never going to be huge, but at least they're trying to bring racing to that region, and the demographic centre of Melbourne is always stretching out that way. A lot of young families live in the area. Night meetings on a summer Saturday is worth pursuing, looking at something like a 5pm-8.30 or 9pm slot. It's extremely hard to make a cultural change though.
casper
Guest
the problem with Racing Vic is they are probably stuck in a traditional rut, the 30-35 minutes gap between races as occurs on saturday meetings to allow for 3 or 4 states to slot in. That's not an issue at night so they should be scheduling in tandem with Sydney as a midweek option with mooney valley & canterbury racing every alternative 15 minutes, get the meeting over with in 3-4 hours & people can get home. put on special transport options to & from the city & link with clubs/pubs/workplaces as a promotional tool. friday night makes little sense but you can tell it's really all about churning turnover to milk every dollar available.
Tim
Guest
Considering it doesn't get dark until about 9:30-10:00pm in victoria during the height of summer. I don't think they even need to install flood lights. Start the meeting at 5:30 or 6:00pm and have a 20min gap between races. The races would be over by 8:30-9:00pm. The club should offer cheaper drinks for night racing, turn it into a uni night wednesday and along with cheap drinks, have free punting guides, put a band on after the races finish. Turn it into a real night out. Also have free entry and relaxed members dress rules. If it is 40 degrees no one wants to wear pants and a tie. It is just stupid.