New race shining Jewel

GOLD Coast Turf Club chairman Brett Cook says a new $250,000 QTIS race over 1200m will add to the prestige of one of the city’s already glamour race meetings.

Racing Queensland will introduce the QTIS 2YO Jewel at the Gold Coast Stakes meeting on March 18 next year.

The new event gives buyers 250,000 reasons to secure one of the 400 horses set to go under the hammer at the 2017 Magic Millions QTIS yearling sale next month.

Horses bought through the sale will be eligible for the QTIS 2YO Jewel next year.

The Jewel will be the richest event at the 2018 meeting and adds to an impressive program that already features the $100,000 Listed Goldmarket Handicap and $100,000 Gold Coast Stakes.

Cook said the club wanted to continue to build on the meeting and support the trainers involved.

“Having the increased prestige and prizemoney along with the Goldmarket is fantas- tic,” Cook said. “It would be one of the race meetings we want to try to build.

“Queensland trainers are starting to focus on QTIS races a hell of a lot more.

“Brisbane trainers will be sending all their good horses because it is a metro day but also because of that prizemoney on offer.”

The addition of the race will add to a blockbuster spread of big-money events on four big meetings over the first half of the year for the Gold Coast Turf Club.

“From a marketing point of view we now need to concentrate on the metro days and try to maximise those,” Cook said.

“When you race so many times throughout the course of the year and have a lot of midweeks that come at the cost of the club – and we lose a lot of money on that – it makes the bigger days so important for the financial success of the club.

“We are going to heavily focus on metro days in particular and once we get them up and running, once a month we want to have a themed race day that we can try to concentrate on as we go forward.

“The quality of the racing is getting better and better every year and the increase in prizemoney attracts that.”

Queensland Thoroughbred Breeders Association president Basil Nolan said the QTIS con- cept gave everyone in the state a fair chance to compete.

“In my opinion, QTIS is already the best state-based incentive scheme in Australia, but the addition of events like this just take it to a new level,” Nolan said.

This year the Goldmarket day will offer more than half a million dollars in standard prizemoney and the potential for QTIS horses to secure as much as $105,000 in bonuses.

Racing Queensland chief executive Eliot Forbes said the 2018 race would enhance the stand-alone Goldmarket race meeting that accompanies the March QTIS sale.

“This race rewards Queenslanders,” Forbes said.