The Sandy Lane Gold Cup was run off on Saturday March 7 at the Garrison Savannah to the usual packed Grand Stand. The Arima Race Club (ARC) chose to broadcast the four feature races live to what was a fairly muted reception at Santa Rosa Park. The reality is that outside of Barbados, this race no longer attracts interest. The Cup is essentially a pale shadow of its former self.
When the race was first introduced, it was touted as a Caribbean Championship, attracting the top turf performers from Trinidad, Martinique and Barbados. To the best of my knowledge, Jamaica did send a runner in the earlier years but the different surface was reflected in the performance of their runner and their participation was short-lived. The decline began however when Trinidad switched surfaces from turf to dirt in the early 1990s.
Since that date, the race has struggled for credibility. The latest reincarnation has seen another top American owner, Kenneth Ramsey, show some interest and therefore import a couple of his average runners from the US into Barbados for the sole purpose of competing in the event. For the last two years, Ramsey has supplied the winner–this year with a five-year-old well exposed optional claimer while last year's winner was a seven-year-old graded stakes performer who was well past his prime.
While the Bajans view Ramsey's participation with pride, his presence must surely reflect the low quality of racing in that country. Ramsey is quoted as stating that having won two in a row, he was keen to come back to complete the hat-trick. One suspects that once that goal is achieved, he will lose interest. Local owners must be becoming increasingly wary of investing in decent quality animals since their prospect of competing with the runners parachuted in by Ramsey must be remote. One suspects that they only have to worry about that for one more year.
While Barbadians celebrate their most prestigious race, a similar story can be relayed about the Jamaicans and the Red Stripe Superstakes. The terms and conditions of this race state that it is open to Native Bred three year olds and upwards from Jamaica, Barbados and T&T. This is in sharp contrast to the terms of that country's Derby which only states that it is open to native bred three year olds. Given the recent furor over my assertions re the eligibility to contest that country's three year old classics and the refutation from their representatives, it is curious that the same framers in one case specify where the native bred horses must originate from, but are silent in the other case. It is perhaps the nature of horseracing, where suspicion is never far away!
Like the Gold Cup, this Superstakes has long since lost its relevance as a Caribbean Championship stakes. The race is now almost the exclusive preserve of Jamaican bred runners. Like the Gold Cup, the loss of regional appeal may explain why the sponsors have moved from those with regional presence to those with purely local presences (Sandy Lane in Barbados and Post to Post in Jamaica). Again, in the early years, T&T regularly sent representatives.
When we changed surfaces, we continued to send runners and was even successful with one of our better locally bred creoles, Adoring Groom. More than a few years ago however, we stopped. Barbados never sent any horses to compete in the Superstakes. This race continues to slowly die and with the increasing trend of Trinidad owners purchasing the best Jamaican bred yearlings either at their sales or beforehand, those left to compete in Jamaica are of a slightly lower standard. If there is a race that appears to have Caribbean appeal, it has to be the Trinidad Derby. Over the years, this race has shown a great propensity to attract top horses from Jamaica and Barbados. Besides the best horses bred in Jamaica who are bought and raced in Trinidad, the top Jamaican raced three year olds inevitably compete in the Trinidad Derby eschewing the Superstakes in November.
Additionally, of late, the top three year olds in Barbados are being attracted and last year, the Barbados Derby winner, Voldemort, competed. If the authorities are not going to restrict access to the race, then it is time for a greater effort to be made to promote the race as the premier Caribbean race in the Southern Caribbean.
The Sandy Lane Gold Cup and the Post to Post Superstakes do not attract the same regional participation that the Trinidad Derby does. The issue here is the lack of adequate promotion by those responsible for the sport and to some extent, their continued inability to attract a wider pool of sponsors. With respect to the latter, it seems obvious that the ARC is bereft of ideas as to what to do to raise the attractiveness of the sport. The ARC cannot afford to lose any more sponsors but if we look at the media reports with respect to the NGC, there must be a big risk that that company's continued sponsorship of the Trinidad Derby could be in jeopardy. If that happens, the sport's pool of sponsors would have gotten even smaller. We can only hope that horse racing does not become a casualty of the fallout from that matter.