NSW racing blighted by abandonments

An astonishing 11 race meetings in eight days have been lost in New South Wales, while a feature Gosford meeting was moved, as wet weather creates havoc.

Since last Saturday, when Lismore and Binnaway picnics lost their meetings, meetings at Bathurst and Nowra on Sunday, Gunnedah and Taree on Monday, Goulburn on Tuesday and Grafton on Thursday have been called off, either before a race was run or during the day.

Racing NSW has already called off meetings at Kembla Grange, Tuncurry and Quambone this Saturday. Kembla had copped over 200mm of rain in a week, while Tuncurry received 70mm of rainfall over the past 7 days and a further 30mm of rain is forecast on Saturday.

Newcastle, which also has up to 30mm forecast for Saturday will now host the standalone Saturday meeting which was scheduled to be run at Gosford. That meeting includes the $500,000 The Coast, the $300,000 Gosford Gold Cup and $250,000 Takeover Target Stakes.

Gosford was rated a heavy 10 after 100 mm of rain on Monday, and while only 14mm of rain fell over the next three days, it was decided it was too wet to proceed. The move was made on Thursday, with the expectation of more rain to come.

Looking further forward, the meeting scheduled at Kempsey next Tuesday has been already abandoned following 45mm of rainfall over the past seven days and a further 17mm of rain forecast over the weekend. A new meeting has been scheduled at Armidale in its place.

Sapphire Coast’s meeting scheduled for Sunday has been shifted to Queanbeyan with the track already a Heavy 10 and further heavy rain expected to fall.

Adding to the headache for trainers is that a host of trials have also been abandoned due to the weather.