Daniel Akpeyi Chief’s hero in derby

ARC bigwigs discussed marketing strategies for racing concluding that “tradition in racing is important, but there is a need for innovation”, said Dr Makoto Inoue, vice chair of the Asian Racing Federation (ARF) and presidential counsellor for International Affairs of the Japan Racing Association (JRA). Speaking at the start of the second plenary session of the 38th Asian Racing Conference (ARC) in Cape Town, Inoue said: “A very important aspect of our sport is tradition. Tradition is seen through our time-honoured races and race programme. Tradition will always be important in our sport; however, it is also important that racing doesn’t stand still. We must continue to innovate, to challenge and to discover new opportunities.” A racing innovation employed in Japan recently was explained. It was based on the concept of the All Star game of professional baseball and born out of a desire for the promotion of fan involvement. Japan, which has the largest number of racing fans in the world, created a way for fans to have tangible involvement in the makeup of the “all-star” field in the stayer’s race, the Arima Kinen, with a staggering 1,577,760 fans voting in 2019. Fans casted their ballots at racecourses and off course betting sites (18%), by mail (2%) or through the official website (80%), with the 10 horses with the most votes going forward to the race. In 2019 for the 64th running of the Arima Kinen, Japanese superstar mare Almond Eye garnered the most votes with 109,885, while the eventual winner, Lys Gracieux, was the second most popular with 94,357 votes. “The Arima Kinen has the largest betting turnover in Japan annually, with 43.6 billion Yen (approximately US$400 million) wagered on the 2019 race and an attendance of more than ninety thousand people on the day,” explained Shuji Kashiwada, general manager of the JRA’S International Department. With betting and attendance figures consistently outstripping those of the Japanese Derby, the concept of an ‘All-star’ race such as the Arima Kinen has been hugely successful. Kashiwada also pointed out that its positioning on the racing calendar, as the final championship race of the year, the so-called “Dream Race” perfectly ends the racing season. The most memorable being the iconic Deep Impact, who won the Arima Kinen in December, 2006 and then retired straight afterwards in a moving ceremony.

Famous celebrities

Promotion of the race is a year-long affair with famous celebrities featured in JRA adverts, while the race is highlighted online through Youtube and on a special website created in collaboration with a popular animation series. The print media also plays a prominent role, with newspapers, weekly and monthly magazines plus comics promoting the race. Billboards, posters in trains, street events at train stations in major cities such as Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya and Fukuoka and the production of commercial films called “Weekend Memories”, all contribute to the buzz about the race. With a rich history of feature races, including the “Race That Stops The Nation”, the Melbourne Cup, being run for the 160th time in November, 2020, Australia is another country where horseracing is extremely popular. However, the landscape in Australia has evolved over the last five years, with a number of new races including the country’s first slot race, the Everest, a 1200m contest, launched in 2017. Delegates heard from Racing Victoria chief executive, Giles Thompson, who highlighted changes by the organisation, including launching a race based on the Arima Kinen. Fan involvement may be a new concept in Australia, but it has been well-established internationally. Thompson explained why the All-star Mile was selected as the way forward for Australia.“we needed something that was unique in Australia. The All-star Mile appealed for a variety of reasons. It is a unique concept not seen in Australia before, a point of difference and it aligned with our “Racing For All” concept. It only costs A$500 to enter horses, public votes are free and it is the fans who control which horses get to run.” While Australia cannot match the involvement of Japanese fans, the 2019 launch still attracted a solid 139,247 votes. The highest number of votes came from 25 to 34-yearolds and, with 43% of the voters being female, the race therefore enabled Racing Victoria to engage two demographics underrepresented among Australian racegoers. In the panel discussion that followed, the speakers were joined through pre-recorded video by Peter V’landys, chief executive officer of Racing New South Wales (Racing NSW). A series of questions were posed to V’landys and to the panellists, with a number of differences coming to the fore. Asked about the driving force behind racing developing innovative concepts, V’landys said it came down to appealing to a wider audience than the traditional fanbase: “For us, it’s about generational change. Our generation is different from the upcoming generations, and I even see that in my office with a 28-year-old very different to a 20-year-old. “They are different types of customers. If we continue to aim at the existing fanbase and the older demographic, we won’t leave a future for racing. I don’t care what anyone says; by doing business the way we’ve always done it, we’ve been on the decline. You have to reassess if things aren’t going right, you have to move with the times.”