BATHURST Thoroughbred Racing Club will look to finish a testing 2014 year on a big note this Friday with their final meeting for the year, and judging by initial nominations, there will be no lack of quality racing.
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With final acceptances due this morning, all but one of the seven races had at least 14 nominations, with each race allowing for a maximum field of 14 entries.
The only exception was a Class 2 Handicap but even that race itself still attracted 12 nominations.
The feature event on the program will be a Benchmark 60 Handicap (1,800 metres) which should provide a reasonable staying test for the contenders.
Of the nominees for that event, local trainer Paul Theobald is flying the flag for the region with Bathurstian coming into the race in reasonable form, thanks to seconds in Bathurst and Orange prior to a last-up sixth in Dubbo.
BTR general manager Michelle Tarpenning says that the interest has been pleasing and the meeting shapes as a good finish to what was a tough year at times.
At one point the club had their licence suspended after track and watering malfunctions.
They rebounded strongly and have since opened a change room for female jockeys and been awarded hosting rights for the first round of next year’s Country Championship.
“It is always encouraging to see the sort of numbers we’ve had for nominations this week,” Tarpenning said.
“We’ve had some pretty wild weather lately but with the hot weather predicted for this week, we still have to pump plenty of water into it and we’re looking at running on a ‘good-4’ on Friday.
“There have been some tough times early in 2014 but I think we’re a far better club for it. We’ve learned a lot, and the fact that we’ve been given the first meeting of the Country Championships by Racing NSW shows we’ve turned things around.”
That meeting is set to be a major focus for the club next year, and it will double as the Bathurst Cup meeting.
The Country Championships will see seven heats staged across the state, each worth $100,000.
The first two finishers in each heat will qualify for a final worth $300,000 in Sydney.
“We’re actually having our first committee meeting this week to start planning for that program. It’s going to be huge and it is great for Bathurst that we get the privilege of kicking the Championships off,” Tarpenning said.
“Normally we would hold our Bathurst Cup at the end of February, but we’ve pushed that back so we can put it on the same race card as the Championships heat.”
