Cash bonanza on offer for Summer Cup grooms

Leaping out of all the fandangle of this week’s press release about the 2023 Betway Summer Cup was an announcement about an “incentive” for grooms.

All the grooms of horses that make the final field for Joburg’s biggest race on 25 November will get a R20,000 “bonus” from the headline sponsor.

With every handler getting the cash, it’s not so much an incentive or a bonus, but more of an acknowledgement of vital behind-the-scenes contributions made by stable workers, as mentioned in the
release by Betway’s Jonathan Blumberg: “We all know the importance of the grooms and this is a reward for their many days and hours of hard work spent.”

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The truth is that for many decades the hard work of grooms in South African racing was not well known or properly acknowledged.

They did all the hard graft – mucking out boxes, feeding, doing early-morning and late-night checks on sick animals, riding work and hikes, not to mention actual grooming. They seldom got proportionate reward for all that.

A couple of unruly public protests by grooms wanting a better deal might have been less than convenient, but the message hit home and the racing establishment realised they had no game without
these hardy folk. In recent years, major efforts have been put into making grooms feel more valued, and a gift totalling around R400,000 from a sponsor is surely proof of that.

Cash injection

Of course, bookmaking firm Betway has already doubled its sponsorship of the Summer Cup itself, boosting the prize to R5-million for the famous race that was first run in Joburg’s earliest days in the late-1880s.

And the sponsors are promising a day to remember in the marketing hype that is already in full flow two months out. Words like “sizzling”, “hottest” “ultimate” and “spectacle” are in evidence.

Tickets are already on sale for the event and “Summer Reign” has been adopted as the theme for Turffontein Racecourse.

Tickets are available at Ticketpro, and at the Betway Summer Cup website, from R100 for adults and R50 for kids under 12.