Michael Fitzsimons, the Jockey Club’s executive director of wagering products, has labelled extreme odds changes the “Achilles' heel of pari-mutuel wagering” while outlining a string of innovations planned to grow the World Pool.

Fitzsimons said the drastic shortening of odds in the seconds before the start, and often after the jump, is racing’s “perception challenge” and a “terrible customer experience”, confirming officials plan to work with professional gamblers to alleviate perceived unfairness.

Much late movement comes from sophisticated computer teams using technology to place wagers as late as possible.

“We believe professionals are welcome and necessary in the pool and in Hong Kong we have developed a lot of expertise in managing them professionally and sustainably for everyone,” Fitzsimons said.

“For the first time, we are proposing this year to work on the World Pool professional hubs, where we come together with operators to agree the rules and through our smart contracts technology, we will enforce these rules no matter where the professional enters the pool.”

Fitzsimons says new technology has shortened the gap between online bet placement and odds update by 45 per cent and said “we won’t rest until we have this down to mere seconds”.

As the World Pool pushes towards operating on the world’s top 100 races – it’s currently at 23 – officials are also working on a data hub aimed at offering a global product which will enable punters “to do the form on overseas races the way they do the form on their local racing”.