Racing Radio

mah stick it up for sale. vision will probally buy it

They already have 2 licenses in Melbourne. East and West. 1611 and 1665 I think?

They probably wouldn’t knock back an in band Melbourne wide frequency.

The challenge might lie in differentiating themselves from the Vision BLV (3RPH) station on 1179.

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True. Good point.

We’re starting to stretch at the speculation of ramifications here though! A chain of events with 927/1116 moving around that may lead to a shake up of all the Melbourne AM narrowcast stations too.

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Is it a sign of things to come? Will SEN make an offer on Sky Sports Radio as well?

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I’d be rather surprised if Tabcorp ever sold Sky Sports Radio (or 2KY as some people I know still refer to the station as) given that it’s tied in rather well with the Sky Racing channels on Pay TV.

But far stranger things have happened…

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I’d completely forgotten that period when SEN Track was on there. If RSN is barely rating, I can’t imagine what Track is doing up the end of the dial.

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A lot of people on here also seem to forget that 1377 was “SEN+” before it was “SEN Track” too. SEN+ was basically a simulcast with a few opt outs of 1116 and alternate live sports. Now it’s back to good ol’ 3MP but not before Classic Rock Radio and a brief stint as MTR too.

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Sorry as this is probably a stupid question. Does Sky Radio (owned by TabCorp) run every other racing Service in Australia apart WA and Victoria? I think in SA that still call it TAB Radio?

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As far as I can tell, this is the branding and ownership status of Australia’s main racing radio services:

NSW/ACT: Sky Sports Radio - owned by 2KY Broadcasters Pty Ltd, a subsidiary of TabCorp.
QLD/NT/SA/Tasmania: RadioTAB - owned by UBET Radio Pty Ltd, a subsidiary of TabCorp.
Victoria: RSN, currently owned by the consortium of Victoria’s thoroughbred, harness & greyhound racing bodies under the subsidiary of 3UZ Pty Ltd.
WA: 6TAB/Racing Radio, owned by Racing and Wagering Western Australia.

TBH I’m surprised that TabCorp haven’t yet tried to streamline their separate radio racing services into one…unless of course they’re waiting to get hold of the TABs and racing stations in every state & territory.

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Believe that RSN is also on 88.7 in Canberra, the former ACTTAB frequency (in addition to Sky on 1008). @dxnerd may be able to confirm?

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Western Australia’s RWWA-owned service has been branded as “TABradio” for a little while now. Perhaps a little confusing compared to “RadioTAB” in SA and other places previously run by Tatts/UBET (which, of course, is now owned by Tabcorp).

[extremely late edit for those reading the thread - though SA definitely used the TAB Radio brand in the 1990s too apparently, but that changed once the QLD TAB (or Unitab or whatever they were called by then) took them over… at that time the WA service was just “Racing Radio”, the latter only changed to “TABradio” with the “TABtouch” rebrand of the WA tote]

In the last six months or so, they’ve started to run a joint service for Sky Sports Radio and RadioTAB out of Sydney in off-peak times - usually after 8pm and as early as 6pm on less important evenings, and I presume they can use it at other times when having someone in Brisbane is infeasible. They use both brands during the time someone live is on (they both simulcast Sky 1 from ~11pm Sydney time until breakfast).

Different tote pools in both isn’t much of an issue given Tabcorp’s pretty much gone “meh” and give fixed odds updates only now - kinda the way that market is going with the rise of other bookies; probably a financial incentive to do so too.

As for a national-ish service… I suspect state parochialism and competition in the industry (particularly between Sydney and Melbourne) and trying to disentangle having three separate tote pools is probably in the way of that right now. The latter may take some time (as some racing bodies don’t like the idea, particularly NSW). The former is probably an unsolvable issue :slight_smile:

As for the non-Tabcorp stations… I suspect the long-term future of RSN really depends on how Racing Victoria in particular see it in their media arsenal going forward - how does it sit in their media mix compared to their Racing.com empire, for instance? The greys and trots have a share but it’d be RV calling the shots.

And WA, of course, just depends on if and when the state government chooses to privatise their TAB I guess.

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I’ve noticed as well that Sky Racing are no longer simulcasting the Big Sports Breakfast on Sky Sports Radio either

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They stopped the TV simulcast when Terry Kennedy left the show at the end of 2019, didn’t restart it when Michael Clarke was named his permanent replacement.

Dunno why. :man_shrugging:

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well there you go

SEN Track on 657AM in Perth seem to broadcast a lot of mainstream sport for a narrowcast racing service. They’ve got Adam Gilchrist co-hosting breakfast a couple of days a week.

Surely they can move SEN Track to say 1611 and have 657 for a full SEN service. Or pick up 882 or 1080 should 6PR and 6IX convert to FM.

In SA we have SENSA but on weekends and some nights it carries alot of the SEN Track programming. It would be good if they had a separate Track station given I think they still have licences in SA they are not using.

That was SEN Track’s plans in places that didn’t have a full SEN station - Sydney’s station did that before 1170 switched over (and it now simulcasts Andrew Voss’ show from 1170), while Brisbane has similar - Melbourne’s station has partly simulcast 1116 breakfast from the start. They also take their state version of Croc/SEN’s “Sportsday” program in the evening.

But the racing radio stations, including the narrowcast services outside of Syd/Melb/Bris, do the same with breakfast.

I’d ridge my eye more that SEN Track does take a certain amount of AFL/NRL coverage (except Syd or Melb) depending on state - not every game though. It’d be a fine line as to how much of that would become a narrowcast licensing problem.

Not sure 657 could be used for a full SEN service - racing radio is OK on a narrowcast frequency but I don’t think all-sport is.

I wonder if the path to a full SEN WA will have to come through DAB+ - it appears they bought space on the Mandurah suite for a fully-branded station, wouldn’t be surprised if they’d do the same if anything became free in Perth. (I had no idea that DAB+ for Mandurah and Perth were managed separately, but, well.)

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One thing I do wonder out of that is how much RSN is getting from being in bed with Tabcorp (it makes sense in one way as part of the tote licence joint venture thing down there) while over the fence they see Hutchy being able to hoover up all the corporate bookie advertisers for Track. The thoroughbred clubs probably already know the value of that since they have three(?) of the big corporates signed up as partners with Racing.com TV.

I’m sure Hutchy would love a second commercial frequency in Melbourne (esp. now they’ve relaunched SEN+ as “SEN Fanatic” on Melb DAB+), and with wall-to-wall racing radio kinda a thing of the past in the face of ubiquitious Sky, maybe they might be able to make RSN an offer they can’t refuse. I’m not sure I’d necessarily like that personally unless they get more unique content for Fanatic, but it’s certainly a possibility.

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My thoughts on a few racing radio matters

They do late nights and weekend evenings (when local state races have concluded). Shared between the 4TAB and 2KY output now. That is more for staffing arrangements/comfort than any huge cost saving.

All four stations, the two Tabcorp, 3UZ Pty Ltd & RWWA contribute to the national racing service, calls from each track.

There’s money to be made from local clients in each state.

GFK ratings are not suitable for the racing audience or most niche audiences.

Sydney’s station is only in survey as Tabcorp had money in the budget. Tatts/Ubet/predecessors never did and the status quo remains.

RSN was removed from survey managements ago in the AC Neilsen era for the reason I gave. It is a waste of money to participate now.

Far more effective, targeted audience research can be undertaken to display what share of those punting are using the service. Remember, it’s more a service to provide information about the business to encourage more gambling. The sale of air time is not the main game, unlike other commercial radio.

Gambling has never excited me, however I do understand that Tabcorp include their audio and video content (Sky radio/TAB and Sky Racing TV) as part of their gambling apps.

Great to read @Spi 's contributions. Good on you for returning.

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