WELCOME TO THE NEW FINANCIAL YEAR (Australian)

Down Under Racing Presents The DUR929

The New Financial Year (in Australia) begins today, and everyone is hoping for a brighter 12 months ahead, unfortunately things still look bleak with more interest rises predicted before slowing down.

Back when our residency began around early February this year, one of our members Matty (chips4u2c) devised a contest based around the scratch breeding of 3-year-olds from a group of nominated sires. These sires were based on the 11 years 1999 to 2009 thus the contest was named the DUR 929. Each year a Sire was nominated (with 4 years having 2 sires nominated), the players had to breed 5 x 3yo’s using either 5 of the 7 single sire years OR 3 of the single Sire Years and 1 of the Double Years.

Sires List:

1999 – Bel Esprit

2000 – Starcraft

2001 – Savabeel

2002 – Written Tycoon

2003 – Snitzel / Magnus

2004 – Street Boss

2005 – Duporth

2006 – Denman / So You Think

2007 – Star Witness

2008 – Smart Missile / Sepoy

2009 – All Too Hard / Pierro

Twelve intrepid trainers took on this challenge and this weekend sees 60 unraced 3 year olds entered in 4 MSW Password protected races specifically bought to begin this contest.

At QUEENSLAND we have the

DUR RESERVE BANK MSW for 3yo fillies over 1200 metres / 6 furlongs (17 entrants) and the

DUR FINANCIAL REVIEW MSW for 3yo Colts and Geldings over 1200 metres / 6 furlongs (13 entrants)

At VICTORIA we have the

DUR INFLATION RATE MSW for 3yo fillies over 1600 metres / 8 furlongs (18 entrants) and the

DUR TAX RETURN MSW for 3yo Colts and Geldings over 1600 metres / 8 furlongs (12 entrants)

All races were bought to allow the maximum 20 starters and the ladies definitely needed the full quota with 35 fillies arriving from the DUR members breeding sheds compared to only 25 colts

With the rules stating that all horses MUST commence their campaigns in one of the above races, anticipation for the 1^st day of the financial year has been high among those residents who bred their babies for this contest.

There is absolutely no way I am ever going to attempt to handicap these 4 races but it is of interest to look at the breeding choices of the contestants.

Most Popular Sires –

STAR WITNESS selected 9 times producing 4 colts and 5 fillies

DUPORTH selected 8 times producing 4 colts and 4 fillies

BEL ESPRIT selected 7 times producing 4 colts and 3 fillies

STARCRAFT selected 7 times producing 3 colts and 4 fillies

Least Popular Sires –

SNITZEL / MAGNUS selected only once producing 2 fillies

WRITTEN TYCOON selected twice producing 2 fillies

ALL TOO HARD / PIERRO selected twice producing 1 colt and 3 fillies

Is it just a coincidence that the more a Sire is used the more the colt / filly ratio evens out? (15 colts to 16 fillies).  Is it also the case that the less you use a sire the more fillies seem to pop up (1 colt to 7 fillies).

CAPPER COLOURS:

I know a lot of players throughout this game pay close attention to the Capper Colour ranking their new born pride and joy attains, so in the interests of assuaging those players curiosity here are the Capper Stats

For ease of comparison, I will assign a number to each Capper Colour from Left to Right

1 [Dark Blue], 2, 3, 4 [Sky Blue], 5 [Pale Mauve], 6 [Pale Yellow] – those numbers with colours listed are the only ones that appeared alongside these 60 horses

No 1 x 5 (2 Colts & 3 Fillies) These consisted of 2 BEL ESPRIT (1 colt and 1 filly) and 1 each DENMAN of 4 (filly 1 of 3) DUPORTH of 8 (colt of 4) and STARCRAFT of 5 (filly of 4)

No 4 x 16 (7 Colts & 9 Fillies)

No 5 x 32 (14 Colts & 18 Fillies)

No 6 x 7 (2 Colts & 5 Fillies).  Interesting to note that SAVABEEL was selected as a sire 4 times and all 4 progeny (1 Colt and 3 Fillies) fell into this category. The others being PIERRO 1 of 1 (filly) SMART MISSILE 1 of 3 (only colt) and STREET BOSS 1 of 3 (filly 1 of 2)

With a minimum of over 10,000 Credits on offer as prizes for this contest it will I believe be a highly sort after prize within the Down Under Racing Residency

Prizes are offered for Trainer – Most Points and best ITM % and Horse – Most Points and best ITM % (1^st 2^nd and 3^rd in each category)

As the scorer of this contest, I look forward to following the careers of these 60 horses over the 12 months duration of this contest. It is planned to be an annual contest with the location and years of the selected sires varying each year, although there may be some changes made so as to accommodate more entrants in forthcoming years.

It should be noted that there are some rules that we must follow, for instance to score a race needs to have a minimum of 5 starters and all horses are limited to a maximum 15 starts over the 12 months duration of the contest. Among a few others as well.

Good Luck to all our entrants may the best horses fall over so my picnic ponies may run past you

Dingo333