Recent revelations that Australian racing administrations were severing prizemoney and rationalising business models served to send the message that the game is in poor health.
Pragmatically speaking, however, these announcements were far more explainable and expectable than many more malevolent concessions which preceded them.
Predictably enough, harness racing has been affected, and with what participants have endured through the past quarter century, no words will placate their pain or dull their disenchantment.
What all three codes must resist, however, particularly harness racing, is what psychologists call “learned helplessness”, which manifests via sustained, seemingly repetitious disappointment.
What we’re facing at present is neither stock nor standard.
Heartless as this sounds, the COVID pandemic was catastrophic for humanity but also served as an oasis for racing Australia-wide.
This reality materialised in two disparate yet cardinal forms.
As most that love the game know, turnover spiked through local lockdown periods with captive, restless audiences desperately seeking entertainment and release.
More poignantly, however, racing’s economic importance was both revealed and exposed.
As was its resilience and versatile virtues.
Thankfully, from a broader, more pertinent global perspective, COVID was eventually tamed to the point where lockdowns were terminated, and life returned to normal.
The consequences of that period, however, remain resonant.
Particularly for racing.
For most, you see, punting is a pastime which one enjoys with residual funds.
It’s a luxury of sorts, and that’s the way we want it.
With interest rates exploding and cost-of-living pressures reaching their climax, hobbies like the flutter are – and should be – casualties of war.
Truthfully, nobody knows when this mini recession will resolve, least of all those revered economists who cast themselves as gurus despite possessing a similar foresight to tipsters and meteorologists.
Too often in the past, racing folks have suffered while most others thrive.
Right now, everyone is suffering.
Humbling as that reality may be, however, harness racing leaders – in Victoria at least – are painfully cognisant that owners, breeders, trainers and drivers have suffered far too long.
Sadly, sins of the past, in various ways, have ensured this current, broader crisis will doubtlessly result in dramatic consequences for some that love the game.
Hope, however, quietly endures.
Albert Einstein once opined that in the midst of every crisis lies great opportunity.
That proverb was proven through COVID and can hold true in our current predicament.
What we need is valour.
And belief in revolution.
In the past, game-changing concepts have been silenced via bureaucratic means.
Ultimately, the results of this conservative approach are there for all to see.
Fortunately, however, at HRV at least, those charged with the task of leading the trots forward are made of different stuff.
That’s not a promise we’ll graze on greener pastures any time soon.
It is, however, a considered pledge that times have truly changed.
And that aspiration, not compliance, will dictate going forward.
The opinions expressed in The Forum are those of the author and may not be attributed to or represent policies of Harness Racing Victoria, which is the state authority and owner of thetrots.com.au.