RACING AT Caymans Park progressed on a sour note Saturday when for the second time in recent weeks, the tote board on the infield was non-functional.
Disgruntled punters strongly voiced their disapproval as this was in fact the second time this month that the tote and accompanying message board proved useless, reviving sad memories of the previous tote board which had to be replaced due to frequent malfunctioning during the latter part of the 80s.
When contacted yesterday, Walford Brown, acting CEO of Caymans Track Limited (CTL), said the problem with the tote board is being addressed as a matter of urgency and promised that by Friday (Emancipation Day) things will be back to normal.
"We are working on the problem and it is my firm belief that it will be rectified by the next race meet on Friday", said Brown. He went on to point out that the board was functional up to 3:00 p.m. on Friday afternoon, then something went wrong.
"It was an electronic problem and we were unable to get it back up. We have contacted the manufacturers, United Tote in the States (Pennsylvania) and some new circuit boards have arrived in order to rectify the situation", he explained.
STATE OF THE ART TOTE BOARD
In 1989, the state of the art Tote board was mandated by the then Minister of Finance, Seymour Mullings and implemented by the new Danny Melville-led administration at CTL at a cost of US$1 million. Despite the high price tag, the new totalisator proved a wise investment by the Manley government as it helped in no small way to turn around the fortunes of the racing industry in the early and mid-90s.
The electronic tote system worked perfectly for over 13 years until problems began to crop up in recent months, raising questions as to its reliability in the present scheme of things. Is the technology from 1989 getting too old?
Meanwhile, Brown also commented on the Racing Pools slated to go online, disclosing that its reintroduction is being held up owing to difficulty with a specific mode of programming.
This he said has to do with aspects pertaining to the off-time favourite in the event of a late non-starter and how best to approach the intricacies involved. Until this matter is resolved, the acting CEO said he was unable to give a definite restart date at this time.
However, he was quick to point out that the Racing Pools will be far more appealing and assessable when it returns online. The game will be conducted twice weekly (Wednesdays and Saturdays) and if that wasn't enough, will allow a punter to post his Pools even on a Saturday morning, minutes before the first Pools race is run.
- Orville Clarke
