Bellew: 'It seems to be a closed shop'
"We're spending our own money and there's very few clubs around NZ spending their own money on their own stakes."
Jamie Searle is a long-time Southland racing writer. For more of his work head to the Southland Thoroughbreds Facebook page.
Southland Racing Club president Sean Bellew says the $120,000 Southland Guineas is overdue for Group III status.
The 3-year-old classic is currently a Listed race that attracts quality horses from all over the country.
This year's edition of the guineas will be held at the SRC's main race day of the season at Ascot Park on Saturday, along with the $60,000 Invercargill Gold Cup and eight other races, Total stake money for the day is $505.000.
The Southland Guineas and the White Robe Lodge Weight-For-Age, (held at Wingatui), both at $120,000, are the richest races south of Christchurch. The White Robe Lodge WFA is a Group III race.
Bellew said Canterbury trainers were regularly sending horses to race meetings in Southland to chase the good stakes.
Clubs received funding for stakes from New Zealand Thoroughbred Racing. The SRC puts extra money into stakes when it can to help industry participants.
The SRC wants its premier race, the Southland Guineas, to have a stake fitting the high-class race that it is and to do that, the SRC uses its own funds to boost the stake.
“We're able to do that due to our commercial operation and profitability on race day. We're committed to the industry doing what we can," Bellew said.
"You look at the quality of those fields on Saturday, they're the best fields to have ever gone around in Southland and it'll be reflected by the turnover on the TAB on Saturday.
“I'm sick and bloody tired of all the rewards going north of Matamata . . . it seems to be a closed shop," Bellew said.
“If you live north of Matamata you've got all the riches and rewards [in racing], you can pick and choose where you race.”
Bellew will speak to NZTR's chief executive Bruce Sharrock about the Southland Guineas becoming a Group III race when NZTR holds a meeting with Southland's racing industry people in Invercargill on Friday at Ascot Park racecourse, from 12pm to 2pm.
"I'd like to challenge Wellington and ask why they cannot give us Group status [for the Guineas]. We're spending our own money and there's very few clubs around NZ spending their own money on their own stakes," Bellew said.
To get Group III status for the Guineas would be “reward for our hard work and toil down here,” Bellew said.
Meanwhile, the Southland Racing Club's Cup and Guineas meeting on Saturday promises to be action-packed.
Southland-trained horses should measure up in the feature races, with Riverton horseman Kelvin Tyler saddling top chances Aberlour and Lady Sass in the ILT Ascot Park Hotel-sponsored Southland Guineas.
Aberlour won the Gore Guineas on January 20. Lady Sass ran in the Group I 1000 Guineas at Cup Week in Christchurch and in her latest start, missed the start by three lengths and finished strongly for fifth in the Group III Desert Gold Stakes at Wellington on January 20.
Quintabelle, also in the Southland Guineas, is raced by Southland owners from the Christchurch stable of Anna Furlong and Shane Kennedy. Quintabelle was crowded and checked 50m off the line when in contention in the Dunedin Guineas on February 3. She finished a close up sixth.
Western Southland-trained horses have a proud record in the Baillie & Lewis Pharmacy-sponsored Invercargill Gold Cup.
Horses from the west have won five of the past seven Cups - Dunhill (last year), Orepuki Lad (2021 and 2019), Beam Me Up Scotty (2020) and La Nouvelle Vague (2018).
The Tyler stable.will saddle the likely favourite Shockallia for this year's Cup. He will be ridden by Lisa Allpress who is seventh on the national jockeys' premiership with 46 wins this season.
Shockallia has won his past two starts, including the Dunedin Gold Cup on February 3.
Southland stables hold a strong hand in the day's open sprint, the Cruickshank Pryde Southland Stakes, with Henry Hubber, The Radiant One and Lightning Jack lining up.
