OFFICIALS SET TO LEARN OF COAST’S METROPOLITAN CHANCES
GOLD Coast racing officials are on the cusp of finding out if they will boast the second metropolitan race club in the state as the deadline looms for Racing Queensland to reveal the next two years of programming.
With $26 million in new funding secured for prizemoney increases by Racing Queensland, the Gold Coast’s focus has turned to securing more metropolitan meetings.
Racing Queensland will meet in the coming weeks to finalise their programming for the entire state and it could involve the biggest shake-up of scheduling in recent memory.
Gold Coast currently hosts about six metropolitan meetings a season and officials want to virtually double that figure.
The club filed a development application to council for the installation of lights at the track in January and hope to have the work completed by the end of 2019.
It will give the club the ability to race on Friday nights, opening it up to an international market, including Singapore, and new revenue streams.
The development has been approved by the Gold Coast City Council.
If successful, Gold Coast would become the third Queensland metropolitan track and second club behind the Brisbane Racing Club, who operate both Eagle Farm and Doomben.
“Part of our long-term strategy is to have more metropolitan days,” Gold Coast chairman Brett Cook said.
“It will be interesting to see what Racing Queensland do with the programming because they may have to restructure the whole southeast Queensland corner as night racing comes in here.
“We want to officially become the second metropolitan track in Queensland. We have six to seven metro meetings a season now but we want to ramp that up to 10 to 12.”