letters to the racing post.

​Although I had a few letters published in the old Sporting Life, none of which I have any proof of – the cuttings will be somewhere in the house – it is the Racing Post that has indulged my need of expression of thought, concern and idea.
I am over-privileged by editors of the Racing Post in that I have had over 104-letters published during the paper’s existence. I say ‘over 104 as on occasion I have forgotten to take a cutting from the paper as proof of publication. I am not a diligent or tidy man when it comes to either my writing or the keeping of ‘important’ documents, a fact proven to me when I realise the titles in my document file is now approaching 1,400. I excuse my lack of ability to have different ‘envelopes’ for different categories of files by assuming I make life difficult for hackers if I should ever be considered worth hacking, which I am not as I do not bank on line or keep any personal information within the documents.
Yesterday – I do not know why as I had not planned to do so – I went through my clippings box and sorted the cuttings into three divisions. Those I had published when I lived in Gloucestershire, those published from where I currently live, though before I read on-line, and those published since I took out a subscription back in March 2023.
The numbers are, Gloucestershire 36, Devon 41, subscription 27. Total 104.
I do not know if this is any sort of record or if it worth boasting about. But it is good for my mental health. You see, this sport is my wealth, even though I am a poor pensioner; I care about it as someone cares for a loved-one. It pains me to hear it wrongly criticised by people who know little about the sport, who cry crocodile tears when our horses suffer fatality and offer no sympathy to those whose lives are shattered by the death of that horse. It annoys me that the sport has been allowed to drift so far backwards that in any world league table of racing prosperity, prize-money, attendance or prestige, we would be behind countries that once worshipped at our feet in every category bar, perhaps, prestige.
Although I have this website, I have no audience or readership of note. This is very much a vanity website. I refuse all entreaties for commercial sponsorship or for others to have a voice on my platform or chase a greater number of hits. If people fall upon the site, I am pleased. If they communicate, I try to respond, though you will be amazed at the gobbledygook I sometime receive. The site, though, allows me get things off my chest and into print and off my mind, that otherwise would nag away at me. The site is an outlet; the Racing Post letters column a voice to the world.
Although flattered that the Racing Post indulge me to a far greater extent than they refuse me, what disappoints me is only very occasionally do I elicit a response from fellow Racing Post readers. To me, a letters column should invoke debate, an exchange of ideas, with, perhaps, Post journalists taking up the cudgels and putting a more professional spin on the exchanges. I am firmly of the opinion that no one sector of the sport has ownership rights to the sport and that it is ‘our’ sport too. By that I mean the spectators, the enthusiasts, the readership of the racing media. Often, I read letters by other readers that give a clear insight into a problem, especially by people of my age who feel disenfranchised by the way the sport’s promotors deem fit to market the sport at people who at present are non-racegoers. Racecourses with a policy of card-only transactions are actively driving away custom in times of declining attendance, for instance. This subject should be debated as often as the Gambling Commission and the Government twin assault on our betting shops and punters. 
Letters columns are a mirror that all heads of racing’s stakeholders should stare at on a daily basis, to reflect on their policies, their preferred way of operating and if they are in conflict with their masters, the public.
Not all of those 104 published letters do me justice, though many of the topics I commented upon in the past have played out in my favour. Recently, I have come to realise that I should refrain from making comments on topics that are beyond my level of understanding, as with the finances of racing, though I still contend a monopoly of one sort or another is our only chance of righting the ship, and the meddling of the Gambling Commission.
Tomorrow, or the day after if I cannot get round to the research required today, (going though all 1,400 of those files, I will give a flavour of the topics that have irked me to send off a letter to the Racing Post, and the ideas for the betterment of the sport I have put forward. This will be solely for my benefit, you understand, as this website has such a very short reach.