First Oakbank Easter Racing Carnival is run since club ditched jumps racing

Thousands of people have descended on Oakbank for the first jumps-free Easter Saturday Carnival. See all the pictures here.

The iconic Oakbank Easter Racing Carnival has embarked on its new future, casting aside almost 150 years of tradition.

Thousands gathered at the picturesque racecourse in the Adelaide Hills on Saturday for the annual two-day event which, for the first time since the late 1800s, does not feature jumps racing.

One racegoer who believed Oakbank had kept its uniqueness despite its new look was South Australia Governor Frances Adamson AC.

Mega gallery: Oakbank Easter Carnival

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Mrs Adamson, who was raised in Adelaide, spent several hours at Oakbank with her husband and daughter.

“I haven’t been here since I was 18,” she said. “It is still a wonderful atmosphere.

“What the (Oakbank) committee has done is preserve what makes it such a special picnic race meeting.”

Racegoers enjoyed barbecue breakfasts, picnic lunches, cold drinks at a smattering of bars, punting with on-site bookies and campsite reunions.

Oakbank chairwoman Arabella Branson said the first day of the new-look carnival was a success, especially during the ongoing pandemic.

Ms Branson said her committee was fighting to ensure Oakbank survived without jump races such as the Great Eastern Steeplechase and von Doussa Steeplechase.

“We have nothing to personally gain or hide,” she said.

Jockey Jess Eaton hands out Easter eggs at the Oakbank Easter Saturday Racing Carnival. Picture: Brenton Edwards

“We are a committee of volunteers who are steadfast in the view that every decision has been in the best interests of the club. We do not believe in living in the past.

“We believe a pro-jumps committee is a dead end for Oakbank.”

Prominent trainer Tony McEvoy, who’s trained three winners, said he believed the new Oakbank format would help secure its future. “It’s had a great feel about it,” he said.

“The racing has been fantastic, there’s a lot of people around and the meeting has gone as well as could be expected.”

Watching the crowd slowly build during picture-perfect autumn weather was former long-serving Oakbank Racing Club chairman John Glatz, who helped oversee the annual Easter carnival for 36 years.

The crowds at the Oakbank Easter Saturday Racing Carnival. Picture: Brenton Edwards

Mr Glatz, former long-serving racing administrator Frances Nelson QC and retired senior judge John von Doussa have taken the club’s committee to the Supreme Court as part of a bid to have it sacked for backing a decision by racing’s controlling body, Racing SA, to stop jumps racing.

Ms Nelson, who served on the club’s committee with Mr Glatz, was not at the racecourse for the first time in 55 years.

Instead, she spent the day on her nearby farm at Woodside.

“Frances isn’t the only life member who decided not to come,” he said, sitting near a bar named after one of Australia’s top jumps trainers, Paddy Payne, who also did not attend.

“Others who objected to how they made the decision to stop jumps racing didn’t get sent tickets so others have decided to stay away as well. It’s terrible.”

Former Oakbank Racing Club chairman John Glatz at the Oakbank Easter Saturday Racing Carnival. Picture: Brenton Edwards

Mr Glatz disputed an estimate by the club that the event had attracted a crowd of between 3000 to 4000 – tens of thousands less than what annually gathered from early this century to the 1980s.

“I have never seen such a small crowd,” he said.

Mr Glatz, who was seriously burned in the Cudlee Creek fire two years ago, said he was concerned Oakbank would lose its uniqueness by only holding flat horse races.

“It is known internationally as the ‘course of history’, now that history suddenly has been destroyed,” he said.

“What I find particularly upsetting is that this is the first time the name of the von Doussa family (which established the Onkaparinga Racing Club in the 1860s) is missing for almost 150 years.

“Race crowds are hard to get anyway but we had a point of difference with our jumps racing. Now it’s gone, we will just be like every other race meeting.

“What I find particularly upsetting is that this is the first time the name of the von Doussa family (which established the Onkaparinga Racing Club in the 1860s) is missing for almost 150 years.”

Mr Glatz said a large contingent of Victorian and New Zealand horse racing fans had not come to Adelaide because there were no jumps events.

Someone who did make the effort to travel from Victoria for the Easter carnival was motor neurone disease sufferer Chris Ellinburg.

The wheelchair-bound Melbourne jumps racing enthusiast said he had booked his flights and accommodation without knowing the jumps events had been cancelled at Oakbank.

“I was recently told I might have only two years left and it has always been my dream to come to Oakbank to see the Great Eastern Steeplechase and von Doussa Steeplechase,” he said.

“When I saw they weren’t in the race program, I rang the club and they said they had been stopped. It is a shame because it is what set Oakbank apart.”

Glad to be back camping near the Oakbank racecourse in a caravan hand-built in 1938 – but not happy with the loss of jumps racing – was 94-year-old Raymond Todd, who was first taken to the Easter carnival by his parents when he was an infant. Mr Todd, who still plays the piano at the Semaphore RSL, has returned most years since with his growing family, which gradually has taken over most of one of the three camping sites beside the racecourse.

Raymond Todd with his dog Banjo and his 1938 caravan at the Oakbank Easter Saturday Racing Carnival. Picture: Brenton Edwards

“I love coming here because of the fresh air and the serenity,” he said.

Asked how he felt about how the Oakbank committee had decided not to consult with members before making the decision to stop jumps racing, Mr Todd replied: “I think it was very rude.”