David Senior commented ” Whilst we really wanted to retain Rasus as a series of racing as in previous years across Wales, we were pursuaded that the single date offered to Amman Valley in June and the date of 21st July was the best we were going to get this year and we are now going to turn this into a positive force (Rasus will also screen 11 hours from Tregaron at the end of August). I was desperate to keep the Crock of Gold going and came up with the idea of running it like The Little Brown Jug in the US with free for all heats and final on 21st July. Fortunately Geraint and S4C agreed and between us we have found the £5000 prize money that was paid last year.  Initial comments have all been positive and it is starting to create a real buzz. Once we get the go ahead for the date change we will start to work on building up the card so that it will be a memorable event. I want to thank S4C for their continued support of harness racing and Geraint for all his hard work.”

Please keep upto date by visiting the website.

After having invested over £1 million in the sport at Tir Prince it is not pleasing to see the revenues from harness racing decline to such an extent (gate receipts, tv funding, fewer horses in training etc) that the number of meetings has declined sharply. We are not the only hard track to have had to cut back and in fact he recently announced the closing down of the Sire Stakes (since reprieved) for similar reasons. We are proud however of the quality of the racing we put on and the times, integrity and fairness of the racing we put on is as good now if not better than ever before.

Where we differ of course is that Adam Williams and myself spend our own money but the BHRC spend other peoples and only the licence holders can pass comment as to whether the £80000 overspend was well spent.

He points out that we no longer have a vote at the BHRC this is true,but again this says more about the BHRC than us. If this national association no longer wants the best track in the country to have a vote than maybe we are better off out of it. We have taken legal advice about the Chairman’s actions taking our vote away and it was clear and unequivical “It was unconstitutional” but it is evident that we are not welcome at the moment and we will not be pursuing membership at this time.

We will attempt again on our 21st anniversary to put on quality meetings at Tir Prince however many this maybe.

MARKET AND CAR BOOT

Saturdays start on 25th February

Sundays start 1st April

Open all over the Easter holidays

TROTTING AND HARNESS RACING

5 or 6 race meetingss hopefully 1st meeting Tuesday 5th June with a crock of Gold Final meeting on Tuesday 4th or 11th September, details to follow

STUNT SHOWS

Confirmed 1st date the evening of Saturday 28th April (details to follow).

Probably one or two more in August.

SPEEDWAY STYLE RACING

There will be another meeting(s) trying to arrange a 2 day meeting possibly for the August Bank Holiday Weekend (details to follow).

FAIR AND GO KARTS

Opening no later than Saturday 31st March, there will be new rides and attractions during the year, see website for details.

CIRCUS

Not confirmed yet.

See website for regular updates

The BHRC no longer have a separate account for the Prakas fund but include this cash figure as part of the bank account, the £50,000 owed to the Prakas fund is shown as a creditor on the balance sheet. As the BHRC has no other evident means of settling the debt to the Prakas fund then the first £50,000 of any bank balance needs to be discounted. In any event the BHRC accounts at 31st March 2011 show £103,280 in the bank which means that the BHRC spent £82,386 more than it earned in the 5 year period to 31st March 2011 an average of just under £17,000 per year, ( In the 12 month period to 31st March 2011 the BHRC spent £20,156 more than it earned). It should also be noted that there is only £53,280 in the bank if we discount the amount owed to the Prakas Fund.

We do not know what the bank balance is at the moment nor has the BHRC published a budget for the period to 31st March 2012. However if the BHRC continues to spend more money that it earns at the same rate as it has done over the last 5 years then the £53,280 will be spent before the summer of 2014.

It is to be noted that traditionally the BHRC had been successful in balancing its budget and regularly made a small profit, that in the main the £135,00 that was in the bank in 2006 was because the fees paid by owners, trainers and promoters to the BHRC was in excess of the costs incurred by the BHRC. In the period leading up to 2006 the BHRC produced detailed management accounts and budgets regularly throughout the year and produced the annual accounts in enough time to be sent out with the notice of the Annual General Meeting in accordance with the constitution of the BHRC, this has not happened for some years. It could be argued that because the conditions of calling the AGM were not met then the AGM was not valid and any votes taken at such meeting were null and void.

If a financial disaster is to be avoided then the Directors of the BHRC, ie Members of the Council need to ensure that sound financial management is re-introduced at the BHRC. It is a fact of life that no organisation can continue to spend more that it earns year after year without going bust.

Produced by David Senior FCMA using extracts taken from the official annual accounts issued by the BHRC on 31/03/2006 and 31/03/2011

David Senior asked that the BHRC got a mandate from its members to invest in the promotion and marketing of the sport  to try and get some new blood and young people into the sport and this received widespread support from the floor.

There was also disquiet at the legal cost (purported to be £8,000 according to Gordon Garnett) incurred by the BHRC in the Dave Taff case. Jeff Mound junior said it was madness to incur such costs when the bank balance was only £30,000 he said no businessman would have spent such a high propotion of its cash balances to “prove a point”.

In the other BHRC election Barry Delaney was given the floor and stated that although nobody was opposing him as Vice Chairman that he would not stand unless he was elected as a Steward a position that Bob Lee was standing for. There was a clear vote to re-elect Barry as a Steward.

At the meeting Gordon Garnett was asked to confirm that Tir Prince was to lose its vote at the BHRC meetings he confirmed that because Tir Prince did not hold 8 meetings or more that this was the case. The meeting felt that this needing correcting and the NWHOA would request that Tir Prince be given a vote similar to the arrangement for Tregaron.

The Chairman Jim McInally thanked everyone for attending and added that the next meeting would be in the New Year

You can have anything from basic room hire to letting us take care of everything from food, drinks, entertainment, bouncy castles and theming.

We can supply fresh hot food from our kitchen and when booked in advance, we can also open the bar.

Our spacious open plan room means everything can be under one roof.

email c.hayes@tirprince.co.uk for further information. more pictures can be seen on our facebook site. just search tir prince leisure park.

current discusion is events 2012

join in discussions and give us your views on tir prince and the local area.

The night was memorable for so many reasons. Les Fell and family decided to retire Scoot Around last night, the horse was paraded to the crowd and received plaudits and trophies for its marvellous contribution to harness racing. This 12 year old has held British and Tir Prince records on numerous occassions and in its 35 wins and £60,000 of prize money it won two memorable Crock of Gold finals at Tir Prince, a very hard act to follow.

In the Crock of Gold final we witnessed as good a race as you will ever see and at the final bend only a few lenghts separated all 7 horses, the pace was set by the under rated Bon Jasper and a 57.3 seconds half mile took the sting out of the field but two myths were broken in this race, first you cant win a top race drawn 7 and that fillies can beat the colts because the marvellous Laneside Lexus from position 7 just pipped Matador Hall, Forafewdollarsmore and Crown Manhattan on the line with only a head and a neck separating them and a British record for a fillie, 1.573 what a race and what a horse.

Rocker Laidlaw had an historic hat-trick of wins winning all three live races giving Sheila B Devotion a masterful drive beating a field of 11 in the Trot Britain one mile free for all trot and driving Stoneriggs Mystery to a wonderful win in the Billy Williams free for all pace in the second fastest time ever recorded at Tir Prince, 1.566. In fact he started the meeting off in fine style driving Duggans Pride to victoryin the maiden race.

The Young Welsh Dragon colts final was won by Vicky Gill on Camden Daniel and Mick Lord gave Lyons Pendyffryn a good drive in the grade 1 pace.

Race 4 saw a fabulous race with Ian Pimlott on Southlands Dillinger just caught on the line by the fast finishing Colonel Mustard driven by Richard Haythornthwaite and Chris Nicol came second on Penguins Can Dance. The last race before the live tv races was won comfortably by the hugely impressive Change the Locks in 1.589 from Ayr Mission. This horse has the potential to win a future Crock of Gold.

Full results are shown below