Racing season beginning at club
The 2019/20 racing season has begun for the Wanganui Jockey Club with 11 race meetings scheduled over the next 12 months.
The season (August-July) always begins with the horses’ collective birthday on August 1. The club had their first meeting on Sunday, August 18, which featured jumps racing and flat gallops. The feature race was the Jolt Coffee House Wanganui Steeplechase won by Old Countess for the second year in a row.
Jumps racing is usually over longer distances of around 3000m for the hurdles and 4100m for the steeplechases involving six flights of jumps around the course. Hurdles are not less than 1.3m high and the steeplechase are higher at not less than 1460mm in height. The plastic rail around the track was designed in Australia and imported several years ago for safety reasons to minimise any possible injury to horses and riders.
The Wanganui region has had a golden period recently with several notable national and international achievements. Local trainers Jo Rathbone and Kevin Myers won a rare double on Australian soil when Tallyho Twinkletoe won both the Australian Grand National Hurdle and then the Steeplechase, something not achieved since the 1930s. The jumper is owned by Jo and partner Simon Harrison, and expatron of the club Dave Macnab.
Hunterville trainer Ken Duncan won the NZ Grand National Hurdles with Alfie Dee
in an exciting close finish at Riccarton’s Grand National Carnival. Then on the Saturday Waverley’s Harvey Wilson, who had been pipped in the Hurdles with Bad Boy Brown, took out the Grand National Steeplechase in dominant fashion with It’s A Wonder over 5600m.
Wanganui has legendary jumps trainer Kevin Myers. the perennial winner of the national Jumping Trainers’ premiership, with other local jumps trainers enjoying success at the top level. The next jumps meeting at Wanganui is on Thursday, September 19.
The Guineas & Fillies feature race meeting is this Saturday, September 7, boasting the best racing card of the season for gallops on the flat. This raceday features the HS Dyke Wanganui Guineas and the O’Learys Fillies Stakes both run for stakes of $50k, and the 2-year-olds race for the Taranaki-Wanganui Breeders Association Novice Plate. This will also be a fundraiser for Riding For the Disabled.
Competition for the Sportz Bar Wanganui Punter of the Year title will also be fierce with a prize of $2000 and the trophy up for grabs. Entry is free and racing is from 12.19-5.04pm.