News

Easter Saturday has Golden glow in autumn revamp

27th Apr 2009

Sydney Morning Herald - Craig Young - Monday, 27 April 2009

THE revamped Sydney autumn carnival has come to an end. What about its future?

The Sydney Turf Club's Golden Slipper meeting is now the showpiece, but it attracted fewer than 28,000 people. For the time being it has a set race date. It will be staged on the first Saturday in April.

No longer does the Easter moon dictate when the carnival takes place in the Harbour City. The Golden Slipper date has been locked in. It will be held on Easter Saturday next year. The day once ushered in the start of the Australian Jockey Club's carnival. Easter Saturday is the day to draw a race-day crowd.

More than 30,000 people rocked up to Randwick for the AJC Australian Derby meeting held on the day this year. And it was the worst of the AJC's three consecutive Saturday meetings when it comes to the quality of racing.

Golden Slipper day is far superior but can Rosehill cope with a crowd of 30,000-plus?

Hopefully the STC will do something special for Easter Monday. The AJC has given up on the once grand day.

The Doncaster Mile meeting on the second Saturday for the AJC featured four group 1 races and a remarkable thoroughbred named Takeover Target. The star equine athlete on a program littered with the best thoroughbreds in training.

It could attract a crowd of only 18,130. Last Saturday's Sydney Cup card was another super day's racing at Randwick to close out the carnival but only 16,189 people decided to turn up.

It was Anzac Day but across the road at the Sydney Football Stadium 28,986 people turned up to watch the Dragons pluck the Roosters. There is hope for the Sydney Cup meeting for in two years' time it will fall on Easter Saturday. The AJC had better get to work, turn it into an extravaganza.

So it would seem punters and racing patrons can do the Golden Slipper-Derby Day double but struggle to back up. Will it be the same when the AJC doesn't host Easter Saturday?

It must be a worry for those in charge because the horseflesh turned up for the past seven weeks and continually turned on performances.

There was none to match that turned in by Takeover Target when winning the TJ Smith Stakes. First-up from a break the rising 10-year-old gave the best sprinters in the land a galloping lesson. It earned a standing ovation.

The international traveller fronts up in Adelaide on Saturday before embarking on another overseas journey.

What a marvel.

So, too, Jimmy Cassidy. The Grand Slam-winning jockey was in supreme form notching up group 1 victories on three consecutive Saturdays. He collected two on a horse called Vision And Power. What an advertisement for the ability of young Warwick Farm trainer Joe Pride. From welter horse to dual group 1 winner in one preparation.

There was plenty of drama. Jockey Nash Rawiller misjudged the winning post in the Rosehill Guineas. Sat up on Rock Kingdom, which was beaten a half-head and a nose into third place. There were blowouts in the betting ring for none of the nine favourites won on Golden Slipper day.

Last weekend was similar although punters installed Ista Kareem favourite in a wide-open market for the Sydney Cup and the visitor did the right thing. An ageless eight-year-old.

And special mention to the STC's track manager Lindsay Murphy and his counterpart at the AJC Dave Hodgson. To them and their crews, a job well done. Despite bad weather the tracks stood up to the racing. Some jockeys may have deemed some lanes no-go areas but it didn't stop rivals zipping along them to victory. Interesting carnival indeed.