News

Companies invited to enter competition to rejuvenate Warwick Farm's course proper

28th Aug 2012

The Daily Telegraph - Brent Zerafa - Monday, 27 August 2012

THE Australian Turf Club has invited three racecourse construction companies to be involved in a competition to redesign the Warwick Farm course proper.

While the redevelopment at Randwick has captured much of the attention, plenty of work is going on behind the scenes to improve both Warwick Farm and Rosehill.

Chief executive Darren Pearce said the project is a "three to five-year plan" and would work in with the redevelopment of the Warwick Farm grandstand facilities and the relocation of Inglis.

"We want to keep the grandstand in the same location, we have asked them to improve the camber, widen the course proper, put a slightly longer run-in, there are various options whether the 1400m chute stays," Pearce said.

"We haven't told them what to do but there are things that must be done.

"It has to be a free-draining profile so it is capable of racing in all weather conditions.

"The design contest is great because they use their smarts, engineering and track design expertise to come up with various models and because it is a contest.

"Hopefully we will get a range of possibilities and then we will be able to pick and choose the one that best suits Warwick Farm and the future plans both for racing and training there.

"We would take the track off-line, try and do it in 12 to 18 months when the construction starts on the Inglis site and the site that we are working with another partner on,

"It must be stressed though that we wouldn't disrupt Warwick Farm as a training facility, the training tracks wouldn't be affected."

The ATC received $24 million to spend at Rosehill as part of the merger and $22 million is still left after the construction of the new infield screen.

"We have had designers and master planners working through Rosehill while Randwick has been under construction," Pearce said.

"You can't compromise your two premier assets at the one time so when Randwick is back on line we will get straight in to it.