Victorian & South Australian Racecourses

[Nic]

Been away for a long time guys, middle of last year went to Victoria and South Australia on holidays and took a stack of photos of racecourses and paceways there ... the photos are here http://s1203.photobucket.com/albums/bb393/teenqueen6/ click on "all albums".

Racetracks visited: Goulburn, Corowa, Ballarat, Kyneton, Bendigo, Great Western, Avoca, Ararat, Mornington, Moonee Valley, Camperdown, Caulfield, Flemington, Warracknabeal, Mildura, Dunkeld, Warrnambool, Hanging Rock, Strathalbyn, Murray Bridge, Morphettville, Cheltenham Park, Victoria Park, Gawler, Clare, Hawker, Marree, Cobar, Nyngan, Trangie.

Paceways visited: Cobram, Shepparton, Ballarat, Ararat, Stawell, Ouyen, Mildura, Melton, Terang, Strathalbyn, Victor Harbor, Globe Derby Park.

Highlighted are my favourites.

If you're a member or reader of the Betfair Forum, you'll recognise the photos that I posted there, and you'll know me as Teen Queen.

[Jeffles]

Cool! Thanks, Nic.

Is the Vic Park the same one that is in the Adelaide Parklands?

[Nic]

Yes, just the stand and the gates left now ... a real shame ...

[HoldenV8]

And Cheltenham Park Racecourse here in Adelaide has been closed since February 2009 to make way for an $85m housing development. Adelaide has in the past 10 years lost 2 of its 3 metropolitan racecourses. Now we only have Morphetville.....er.....Alan Scott Park left. Could say the same about our drive-in's but that's not stadiums...

Still, we've also got Globe Derby Park for the Trotts and Greyhound Park for the woofers. And Wayville used to be home of the trotts until 1973.....

[Jeffles]

Racecourses see a lot of activity with trackwork. If not many horses are based in stables in that city, you don't need as many tracks. Horses can train in rural areas or in other cities. SA Racing is pretty dire anyway, but if you keep enough trackwork away from the course proper, you can easily have all the racing in that city to one track.

If it weren't for all the training etc, there'd be little justification in keeping Canterbury and Warwick Farm open. Similar for some tracks in Melbourne (Sandown). The authorities themselves wouldn't like the sound of that. They are a huge asset. Arguably, Melbourne have preserved their number of racecourses by bigging up races at all tracks (Cox Plate and Caulfield Cup). In Sydney, the Chipping Norton Stakes (Warwick Farm) and Canterbury Guineas got moved away from their tracks instead of being used to promote the course.

Do they use that old grandstand for the motor racing?

[Nic]

They don't train horses at Sandown and Canterbury Jeffles ...

We went to the Morphettville races the Saturday we were in Adelaide. There was about the same amount of people that go to midweek races in Sydney, like 400 or so, and about 8 bookies. They raced on the infield track which always detracts from the spectacle ... also went to Mornington when they were racing there, same amount of people and bookie numbers as Adelaide and Ballarat Trots had about 300 people and 1 bookie.

[Jeffles]

I thougt they did, at least at Canterbury. Only strengthens th my point unfortunately. I know some sporting groups have expressed interesst in using the infield there on non-eevnt days for local sport. But I digress. Good photos all in all, Nic.

[Nic]

They trained at Canterbury up until about 1990. I stand to be corrected on that ...

But I can't ever remember them training at Sandown. They did at Epsom which was a training track somewhere in that same area I think. Somebody from Melbourne would be best to comment on that tho'