“It’s just a matter of promotion. You can have tradition, and there are good things about that, but you’ve got to mix it with technology, innovation and promotion. It’s theatre. You’re selling theatre,” Gerry Harvey has opined on the Magic Millions; but good advice to racing in general.
Perhaps the Magic Millions has developed into more of a three-ring circus than turf drama, based on old values, because the original concept was more of a sideshow.
Gerry Harvey watches on at day one of the Magic Millions sales. Credit:Getty
Carl Waugh, who was the first barker of the concept, looked better suited fronting Jim Sharman’s boxing tent compared to Harvey’s slick retail salesman.
Apart from being the playmaker of the latter-day Magic Millions, Harvey is a major breeder and owner. His candidate at the Gold Coast on Saturday, Me Me Lagarde ($1 million Magic Millions for fillies and mares) was a relative bargain, while one of his most valuable horses, De An Andretti, accepted for the $150,000 Midway at Rosehill Gardens but was scratched due to a wide barrier.
De An Andretti is a full sister to the former top-class sprinter Libertini but has been plagued with problems that are testing the master horseman Ron Quinton. However, she will be saved for Canterbury next Friday night.
De An Andretti has only had three starts but has shown potential to inflate her impressive stud broodmare value. Currently, though, she is racing for peanut prizemoney compared to the pelf on offer to Me Me Lagarde – an example of how the unwanted can flourish.
Me Me Lagarde didn’t reach the reserve price of $75,000 at the Magic Millions yearling sales. To date, she has earned $637,800. Forced wide when disappointing at Eagle Farm last start, Me Me Lagarde goes best on her Gold Coast home circuit. She gives the impression of being set for Saturday on a program that promises to be one of the most difficult to find winners on since its inception at the instigation of Waugh and offsiders in 1987 – a distant memory compared to Saturday’s extravaganza.
Horses gallop down Surfers Paradise during the Magic Millions promotion.Credit:Luke Marsden
One aspect that won’t be challenged is the inaugural winner of the two-year-old Classic, Snippets; none of the current crop will be as good.
Still, records are anticipated: a 25,000 attendance plus betting turnover expected to top last year’s $79.2 million, which bested Queensland’s $60 million on Stradbroke day at Eagle Farm.
Alas, will the stage match Harvey’s theatre? Last Saturday, the Gold Coast conditions favoured those up front. Five leaders scored and the others were in the first three at the 600 metres. Navesh Ramdhani, the answers man on Gold Coast ground, reckons it will be fair on Saturday.
Certainly, he rectified the problem of previous weeks, where navigators went to the outside fence. Ramdhani maintains it was the southerly wind last Saturday that enabled front-runners to sprout a spinnaker.
Me Me Lagarde, for one, comes from behind, and so, too, Russian Conquest in the Magic Millions Guineas. With the assistance of James McDonald, Russian Conquest needs clear passage at the right time.
Speed aplenty will have to be overcome in the Magic Millions Classic for two-year-olds, where Gai Waterhouse will be out to add to her already impressive tally of four wins with Platinum Jubilee, ridden by Regan Bayliss. Bayliss has joined the legion of jockeys who have flourished under the Waterhouse get-up-and-go tactics.
Yes, racing has the centre stage, if not the pizzazz of the sale ring where thousands fall like confetti, or the cocktail parties, or thoroughbreds going berserk in beach races that finish on roads.
“When people come to the Magic Millions, we’re putting on a show for them,” Harvey decreed.
However, the Gold Coast on Saturday is no place for old men. Rosehill looks good: no recent bias and an attractive meeting with the likelihood of less traffic jams, both on and off the course.
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