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By Mark Brassel

Murrumbidgee Turf Club at Wagga will host NSW’s only country race meeting on Friday’s Australia Day – and they have a monster afternoon planned.

This is one of Wagga’s feature meetings for the year and being a Friday, the Club is expecting an even larger crowd.

A sizeable crowd will be in attendance at Wagga on Australia Day

“The day will be especially popular on a Friday as everyone will have the weekend to recover and get back to work on Monday!” declared Murrumbidgee Turf Club’s president, Geoff Harrison.

“Tickets are just $10 but for Australia Day, we’re offering two-for-one at the gate.

“We’ll have great racing as always with the rail back in the true position and after the weather we’ve had the track should play superbly.”

The first race on Friday will jump at 1:25pm with the final event getting underway at 5:45pm.

Wagga will have live music from local singer/guitarist Aaron Oldaker with free kids’ entertainment including a free kids’ sausage sizzle, slushies, pony rides, amusements (including a foam cannon), a jumping castle, games and prizes.

Mr Harrison added that MTC has been busy upgrading some of the course’s amenities.

“We’ve been building a communal area for the men and lady jockeys that will give them a bit more room to spread out.

“We received some funding through from Racing NSW on a 50-50 basis and we’re hoping to complete the project by Cup time in May.

“We’re also installing lights for the trackwork in winter and just waiting on the poles; they should arrive by the end of February.

“We aim to have the lights working by the end of Daylight Savings.”

Meanwhile, Deepwater Jockey Club is preparing for a huge, long weekend raceday on Saturday with the running of the 155th Cup sponsored by Deepwater Hotel.

Raceday will see food vendors, a full bar serving ice cold ales including Deepwater Brewing along with bookmakers.

On Friday a Cup Calcutta will be conducted at Deepwater Hotel (The Top Pub) starting at 6pm.

There will be live music straight after Calcutta with free food all night and an auction of a 1% ownership share of Deepwater Hotel’s entrant for the Cup, My Oddette trained by Clint Lundholm with proceeds to the race club.

“The day offers racegoers everything they could want with a fantastic Fashions on the Field competition and the Mud Band performing live from 6pm until late,” said DJC’s president, Doug Stevenson.

“It will be a great weekend for caravaners, campers and those travellers as we’ve set aside an area at the track to take any caravaners that can’t find anywhere in town to stay.

“The Club’s had excellent support from sponsors in Glen Innes, Tenterfield and Deepwater, and we’re focused on putting on the best show we can with the track looking great, although we could do with some rain.”

UPCOMING NSW COUNTRY RACE MEETINGS
Tuesday: Queanbeyan, Murwillumbah
Thursday: Ballina Cup, Tamworth
Friday: Wagga
Saturday: Parkes; Deepwater (non-TAB), Tumbarumba (non-TAB)
Sunday: Grafton