About TTR AusNZ

TTR AusNZ

Overview

TTR AusNZ — The Thoroughbred Report Australia and New Zealand — is a Sydney-based daily digital publication covering the thoroughbred breeding and racing industries of Australia and New Zealand. It publishes a daily edition of news, features and analysis for bloodstock professionals, delivered through its website and email edition, and is known for combining sales and stallion coverage with long-form features, data-led analysis and an increasingly prominent line in industry governance reporting.

The publication was founded in 2018 as TDN AusNZ, the Australasian edition associated with the American Thoroughbred Daily News, and rebranded as The Thoroughbred Report AusNZ in July 2023. It was co-founded by Gary King, its president, and Vicky Leonard, its managing director, who remains its public head. It is a distinct business from Sydney's other bloodstock titles: unlike Breednet, Tara Madgwick's independent results and data website, and unlike ANZ Bloodstock News, the daily newsletter acquired from Spotlight Sports Group by Charmein Phelan in 2026, TTR AusNZ is an independent Australian-owned daily built by King and Leonard, with the American TDN describing it as its sister publication.

History

TDN AusNZ published its first edition on 15 August 2018. In their launch messages, Gary King, as president, and Vicky Leonard, as managing director, said they understood how difficult it was for industry participants to find time each day to stay up to date, yet how much everyone depended on news and trends, stallions, pedigrees, race and sales results; their aim was a publication that could become "the complete toolbox of content that industry professionals need". King brought an association with the American Thoroughbred Daily News, in whose editorial, commercial and international operations he had been involved; Leonard, a New Zealander, came from the Darley Flying Start programme and stud marketing at Arrowfield, and also ran the thoroughbred marketing agency Kick Collective.

The publication settled into the daily-edition rhythm it still keeps: an edition published each morning, a Daily News Wrap gathering the day's shorter items, feature interviews and analysis, sire and sales statistics, and regular columns. Its 2019–2020 team and contacts listing named Bren O'Brien and Paul Vettise on the editorial staff with Richard Edmunds, and regular columnists including John Boyce, John Berry, Jo McKinnon, Alan Carasso, Emma Berry, Rob Waterhouse, Anthony Manton and Trevor Marshallsea. It added audio with its podcast feed — the Connections Cast conversation series hosted by Gus Roland, and the Annuals series revisiting historic racing seasons — and a television strand, Bred To Win with Caroline Searcy, in 2023.

In its edition of 7 July 2023 the publication announced that "over the next week, Thoroughbred Daily News AusNZ (TDN AusNZ) will evolve into The Thoroughbred Report AusNZ (TTR AusNZ)". The announcement explained that the brand had come to represent "much more than just daily news", and that the new name reflected a broader range of resources and tools for the bloodstock professional community, delivered on a mobile-first platform. The site footer adopted "The Thoroughbred Report" branding, and the publication has traded as TTR AusNZ since, while its original domain, tdnausnz.com.au, continues to serve the publication alongside ttrausnz.com.au.

In November 2025 TTR published an analysis questioning whether a 21-year tenure as chief executive was still serving the industry's interests, directed at Racing NSW chief executive Peter V'landys. The article became the subject of Supreme Court defamation proceedings brought personally by V'landys. TTR stated publicly, in a statement of 4 December 2025 noting that three independent racing publications had received legal correspondence over governance reporting, that "responsible journalism must not be met with legal intimidation", and in February 2026 Leonard published a message to the industry — recording that she had co-founded TTR with Gary King because the industry "deserves its stories told well — and its leadership examined openly" — appealing for support to fund the defence, which she said TTR would conduct vigorously. The episode, and the publication's stance, are documented in its own editions.

Content and Coverage

TTR AusNZ publishes a structured daily edition. Lead features cover the stories of the day in breeding and racing — stallion announcements and fee movements, major race results and their pedigree significance, sales previews and reports from the Inglis, Magic Millions and New Zealand Bloodstock auctions, and the business of studs, trainers and owners. Features such as its October 2026 examination of the Caulfield Guineas winners standing at stud, its study of how Japan prepares its young horses, and its profiles of breeders illustrate the analytical, feature-led character that distinguishes it from a results service.

The Daily News Wrap collects the day's shorter items from Australia, New Zealand and the international industry — results, appointments, sales snippets and official announcements, including international content adapted from its sister publication TDN in America and Europe. Around the daily edition sit regular elements: sire and first-season sire analysis, market trend reporting, op-eds and letters, a Saturday preview of the weekend's major racing, podcasts including Connections Cast and Annuals, and video content such as Bred To Win. Governance and integrity reporting has become a significant strand: the publication's coverage of Racing NSW governance in late 2025, and its published statements on press freedom within the industry, form part of its current editorial identity.

Its people coverage reflects Leonard's parallel work in industry advocacy: she founded Kick Up for Racing in 2022, a fact-based campaign correcting misinformation about racing, and organises National Thoroughbred Week, which in its 2025 edition saw more than 5,000 people attend 80 open-door events at stables, stud farms and retrainers across Australia and New Zealand, according to Racing Victoria's report of the week.

Audience and Reach

TTR AusNZ is aimed at bloodstock professionals — breeders, stud farms, trainers, owners, agents and sales participants — in Australia and New Zealand, the audience its founders described at launch as depending on daily knowledge of "news and trends, stallions, pedigrees, race and sales results". Its content is written for industry insiders rather than the wagering public, and its features assume professional familiarity with pedigrees and the sales calendar.

The publisher does not release an audited readership figure, and no audience number is asserted here. Its standing is visible in other ways: the American TDN carries TTR AusNZ journalism with its bylines and describes the publication as a sister title; industry bodies quote its reporting; and the legal and public response to its November 2025 governance analysis — including a statement issued jointly in spirit with two other independent racing publications and an industry-wide fundraising appeal in February 2026 — demonstrated the attention its editorial line commands within Australian racing. Thoroughbred Breeders Australia has also listed TDN Australia and New Zealand among the media partners of the industry's national staff awards.

Digital Presence

TTR AusNZ is digital-only and mobile-first, as its 2023 rebrand announcement emphasised. The daily edition is published on its website — the original domain tdnausnz.com.au continues to resolve to the current TTR site, which also operates at ttrausnz.com.au — with a "Today's Edition" and a searchable edition archive reaching back to the first edition of 15 August 2018. In the week this profile was prepared, the site was publishing current editions, with featured articles dated 9–10 October 2026 on its homepage, including its Caulfield Guineas Saturday preview, and its statements and editions of December 2025 and February 2026 in the archive.

Subscribers receive the edition by email, and the publication extends into podcasts distributed through the usual podcast platforms, video features, and social media channels carrying its daily content. Its older regulars persist in the archive: Wednesday Trivia, sponsored in its day by Darley Australia; the Connections Cast and Annuals podcast series; and the Bred To Win television strand. The February 2026 publisher's message and the December 2025 statement were both published as editions on the site, and the site remains the authoritative record of the publication's position in its legal dispute.

Ownership and Organisation

TTR AusNZ is an independent Australian publication owned and led by its founders. Gary King is its president and Vicky Leonard its managing director; Leonard, writing in February 2026, stated that she "co-founded The Thoroughbred Report (TTR) with Gary King". The publication is a sister title of the American Thoroughbred Daily News — TDN's own description of the relationship — but it is editorially and commercially its own business, and it is not connected to ANZ Bloodstock News or Breednet, the other Sydney bloodstock publications profiled in this series.

The newsroom is small and specialist. Its editions have credited editorial staff including Bren O'Brien and Paul Vettise and a wide roster of regular columnists drawn from both hemispheres, among them statisticians, pedigree analysts and industry commentators; photography is largely supplied by The Image Is Everything, as its editions credit. Leonard's related businesses sit alongside the publication: Kick Collective, her thoroughbred marketing agency, and the Kick Up for Racing advocacy platform she launched in 2022, which she discusses openly in the context of her publishing work. Advertising is sold directly — its site carries an "Advertising with TTR" contact channel — alongside subscriptions to the daily edition.

Contact and Availability

TTR AusNZ publishes daily at tdnausnz.com.au, which serves the current publication, and at ttrausnz.com.au; current editions are available on the site and by email subscription, and the full edition archive back to August 2018 is searchable online. Its editions have long carried a direct line to the managing director for feedback — vicky@tdnausnz.com.au and +61 405 601 152, printed in the Daily News Wrap sign-off — and editorial and advertising contacts are published on the site, including an advertising enquiries channel. The publication is based in Sydney, New South Wales, and covers the Australia and New Zealand thoroughbred industries year-round. No public business email field is recorded for this listing.