October
SeptemberNo picnic out west
I find it a curious and baffling anomaly that there are no picnic race clubs and no picnic racing in the west of the Victoria. Can anyone explain why?
All picnic race clubs are in the east of the state, north and south. The nearest picnic venue to Stawell, for example, is Yea — 301 kilometres away. The furthest, Buchan (584km away), is unreachable.
This means that virtually all western stables are denied the opportunity to participate — to place horses needing a picnic win to boost confidence and to earn a little prizemoney for their connections. Cost-wise, it is simply not worth their while to travel over 300km to the nearest picnic race meeting at the risk of returning empty-handed.
It isn’t even feasible for western stables to hop over the border to South Australia because there is little picnic racing conducted there.
Racing in the west of Victoria is already considered the poor relation of the east and the absence of picnic race venues disadvantages it more. It’s an anomaly that needs to be corrected.
The west already has the perfect venue for picnic racing in Great Western, which is easily accessed from Melbourne and hosts just one “professional” meeting per year, in January.
Great Western (Vic)