On Au­gust 26, pres­i­dent of the Ari­ma Race Club (ARC) Robert Bernard stat­ed that he was qui­et­ly con­fi­dent that the 2021 'Triple Crown' of lo­cal rac­ing will come off once rac­ing re-starts in Sep­tem­ber.

How­ev­er, should the pan­dem­ic not let up and the ARC is un­able to get clear­ance un­til Oc­to­ber then the 'Triple Crown' races will be con­test­ed be­gin­ning in Oc­to­ber, No­vem­ber, with the pres­ti­gious fi­nal leg, the Trinidad Der­by be­ing run off on De­cem­ber 26 (Box­ing Day).

Then the news broke last week that af­ter a meet­ing of the Fram­ing Com­mit­tee of the ARC, there would be no 'Triple Crown' Se­ries and that the Mid­sum­mer Clas­sic, the sec­ond leg of the 'Triple Crown' was tak­en out the Clas­sic Di­ary.

This move has brought a neg­a­tive re­ac­tion from much of the rac­ing fra­ter­ni­ty in­clud­ing own­ers, train­ers, jock­eys and grooms.

With this in mind, Guardian Me­dia Sports spoke with the chair­man of the T&T Rac­ing Au­thor­i­ty (TTRA), Dr David Kan­ga­loo who said, "For rac­ing to be run in T&T, there is a month­ly ap­proval of the pro­vi­sion­al pro­gramme by the TTRA and this is es­sen­tial for rac­ing to take place con­tin­u­ous­ly. The ARC has the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for ob­tain­ing that ap­proval from the TTRA, which is chaired by Dr David Kan­ga­loo.

"The TTRA reg­u­lates the horse rac­ing in­dus­try and is not in­volved in the pro­mo­tion of the sport, which is the sole re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of the ARC.

"At present, the TTRA must grant ap­proval be­cause the race day and the un­der­tak­ing will vary against the rules of rac­ing in this COVID-19 time. The TTRA has the pow­er to amend the rules of rac­ing as need­ed and has as­sist­ed the ARC dur­ing this time. They have as­sist­ed and fa­cil­i­tat­ed rac­ing which they have done con­tin­u­ous­ly in the past."

Chair­man of the TTRA - Dr Kan­ga­loo When asked about the 'Triple Crown' is­sues, the TTRA chair­man said, "I am not aware of any change in the Clas­sic Di­ary. The board ac­cept­ed the Clas­sic Di­ary with the three races ear­li­er this year and to date, we have re­ceived noth­ing for me to state that there is a change. The TTRA un­der my watch will not work on hearsay, we work with facts and if we are not in pos­ses­sion of such, we can do noth­ing. We will not get in­volved in some­thing we know noth­ing of. The sec­re­tary of the TTRA has not re­ceived any­thing from the ARC re­quest­ing a change, nor has any mem­ber of the board stat­ed any­thing about that mat­ter. As of when we speak noth­ing has been com­mu­ni­cat­ed to the TTRA. There­fore from my per­spec­tive and that of the TTRA board the 'Triple Crown' will go on as ap­proved."

Pres­i­dent of the Race­horse Own­ers As­so­ci­a­tion (ROA), Vis­han Ali, who is al­so on the board of the TTRA has told Guardian Me­dia Sports that he does not know of any change to the Clas­sic Di­ary.

"I am not aware of any change, I have nev­er been con­sult­ed about any change. I have heard that a meet­ing took place and a de­ci­sion was tak­en but un­for­tu­nate­ly, I was not a part of the dis­course. As the pres­i­dent of the ROA, I am in the dark, which is not the place where I should be. But, it looks like things are be­ing done with­out con­sul­ta­tion but I am on The TTRA board and this change will be dif­fi­cult to pass."

Nigel Amin, the own­er/breed­er of lead­ing three-year-old Ar­salan, is a very dis­ap­point­ed man. He said, "I hope this will not be done. I feel it for train­er Lester Alex­is who has a gold­en op­por­tu­ni­ty to write his name in the an­nals of lo­cal rac­ing his­to­ry. Re­al­ly, Alex­is has nev­er had a chance to train Clas­sic hors­es in his ca­reer but has done a good job with Ar­salan. Yes, this is his big chance, a chance for a small train­er to make his mark. This op­por­tu­ni­ty should not be tak­en away. Even I am feel­ing a bit hurt be­cause I have the op­por­tu­ni­ty to own a 'Triple Crown' win­ner, which I bred. "

When train­er Lester Alex­is was con­tact­ed, he was very up­set at the fact that the ARC could be think­ing of not hold­ing the 'Triple Crown'. "We have been keep­ing this horse tick­ing over and keep­ing him sound for a chance to land the 'Triple Crown'. We have al­ready lost the Breed­ers Triple Crown as the fi­nal race is off. I am hope­ful that good sense will pre­vail and the Triple Crown Races be runoff," said Alex­is.