A new team-based series with a celebrity element jumped from racings ;ideas bank yesterday but serious concern still exists over whether there will be enough money to pay for it and other initiatives out of the sports piggy bank.
The team idea, which emerged at the BHA annual conference, could be launched this summer. Details are yet to be revealed but jockey/trainer teams with a star captain would race at Friday and Saturday night meetings with quick-fire races and added entertainment.
Rod Street, chief executive of Racing For Change, said: ;This idea got battered by aficionados and trainers, yet the consumers really got it. There needs a celebrity involvement to make it sexy. If we say it is a trainer or a jockey to the broader consumerit is not meaningful. We are looking at a format that looks and feels completely different.
Unconvinced: BHA chief Coward
The initial idea of including leading stables and quality horses has been ditched. A more practical format calls on the wider population of moderate horses, whose owners will be persuaded to let them run in team colours by decent prize and appearance money.
As Street put it, ;money talks. Cash has also been in short supply, something that could hinder wider ambitions for change like a big end-of-season finale to the Flat campaign.
;Premierisation of the fixture list to promote the best of the sport, has also got some smaller courses fearing they will be pushed into economic difficulty despite Streets reassurances.
He added: ;If, through the premier framework, we attract more people, the logic is that there will be a trickle-down effect.
Not everyone is convinced, nor by the confidence of Nic Coward, the BHA chief executive, that a new format of negotiating the Levy racing receives from the gambling industry will deliver more than last years inadequate 85million.
A two-page advert in the Racing Post from betting exchange Betfair stating they were already paying enough was not exactly encouraging ahead of next months talks.
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