What
makes a racehorse club successful?
Written by: Dr Sing Kong Yuen
Date of report: Around 1990
Some 20 years have flown by. Racing in Singapore is no longer the
same as during the time I was the "Junior Veterinary Surgeon" of the
Singapore Turf Club (STC) from 1982 - 1988 and a "Veterinary
Surgeon" of the Bukit Turf Club (BTC) in 1989.
1989 was my last year of employment with the BTC as I decided to go
back to my small animal practice at Toa Payoh Vets
toapayohvets.com which I
started around 1982 after having been working as a
veterinarian with racehorses for around 8 years.
The Singapore
Totalisator Board (STB) was formed in 1988 and appointed an agent,
the Bukit Turf Club (BTC) to take over the racing and 4-D operations
with effect from 1988. The BTC replaced the STC and formed an
interesting task force to reverse the decline in the racing
industry.
The
task force visited racing clubs in
Malaysia, Hong Kong, South Korea and Thailand and
interviewed local racing owners. One of the members was me,
being a veterinarian.
I took some weeks and had written an article
on the business of racing in Singapore in the late 1980s,
comparing Singapore Turf Club with other racing clubs for an
editor of a start up racing magazine.
A start-up racing magazine editor asked me to contribute an article
for his inaugural issue. Rather than writing about common veterinary
conditions of racehorses, I attempted to write a useful article for
the benefit of the racehorses, the trainers and the jockeys. Since I
had spent so much time with the task force, I had lots of
information about the state of the Singapore racing industry and
what was troubling it. A post-mortem of the racing industry and what
to do was essentially what I would write.
The article was obtained by analysing the racing performance
reported in various annual racecourse publications from the clubs in
the U.S, South Africa, Hong Kong and Australia. These reports were
requested by me in writing and the clubs post them to me in my
personal capacity as a racehorse veterinarian doing research on
veterinary viruses affecting racing and experienced by other clubs.
Pages
of the article have been scanned so as to share the historical data
and information with racecourse operators in other parts of the
world and to encourage the younger vets to add value to their
employers and do the right thing, making a positive contribution and
difference to their working environment. See also:
It was an article which I wanted to submit to the STB but did not
know how. It was full of facts and information and it took several
weeks to write as there was so much material from various
horse-racing clubs to analyse and condense into a useful article.
Remember I was just a racehorse veterinarian,
not a manager who produces management reports.
So I hesitated in submitting this article to
the General Manager of the STB who was responsible for reversing
racing decline to the Executive Committee of the STB. He and the new
General Manager of the Singapore Turf Club had no horse racing club
management or horse racing experiences and so had to get research
done by the task force.
It was a "boring article" if submitted in
text as the usual case. It consisted of pages of words and
tables, unlike the printed product with layout and photographs as
published in the racing magazine (12 pages scanned as stated below).
UPDATE ON APRIL
24, 2018:
28 years have had passed. In 2018, the Singapore Turf Club has a new General Manager. In the
newspapers, he was said to want to use the big grounds of the Club
to host life-style activities. He hopes to widen the non-horse
racing activities so as to generate revenue. Stiff competition from
online betting, casinos and other betting outlet have had led to a
reportedly lower revenue for the Singapore Turf Club.
The horse racing magazine had ceased publication. I
hope readers enjoy reading the articles in
the scanned pages as follows:
TOA
PAYOH VETS