Racing Victoria to keep status quo for spring carnival schedule

Racing Victoria has pencilled in a largely unchanged spring carnival fixture but some small changes haven’t been ruled out.

Atishu winning the Champions Stakes at Flemington last year. The spring carnival schedule will remain unchanged in 2024. Picture: NCA NewsWire/David Crosling

Racing Victoria has all but locked in a largely unchanged spring carnival fixture.

Minor tweaks could yet be made to the lead-up schedule to the Caulfield Cup and Cox Plate carnivals, but RV has maintained the status quo after Melbourne Cup Week.

The Thousand Guineas and Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes will be at Caulfield on November 16, with the Cranbourne Cup seven days later on November 23.

Feature racing will return to Caulfield on November 30 for Zipping Classic before the Ballarat Cup takes centre stage on December 7.

• Tabcorp boss: Wagering market will be measurably larger in 10 years

Caulfield Christmas Party Day (December 14) and Pakenham Cup (December 21) round out the draft program.

Victoria Racing Club and Melbourne Racing Club showed interest in the Cranbourne Cup date but RV opted against radical changes.

A new race date at either Flemington or Caulfield on the back end of the carnival would need a prizemoney-boosted card in an already uncertain economic climate.

RV also wanted to reward Southside Racing, Victoria’s second largest racing club following the Cranbourne-Pakenham merger, with feature Saturdays in coveted timeslots.

Southside Racing chief executive Neil Bainbridge welcomed the proposed spring carnival dates.

“Delighted to have the Ladbrokes Cranbourne Cup in the spring carnival again, where it should be,” Bainbridge said.

“Pleased with the backing of RVL and we’ll get in and make every post a winner.

“Pakenham Cup returns to a stand-alone Saturday, so that is a good result as well, so two good cup dates for Southside Racing.”

The Cranbourne Cup, which was won by Charterhouse last year, will keep its spot on the spring calendar. Picture: Vince Caligiuri/Getty Images

While not possible this year, Bainbridge has aspirations for a “Southside Carnival”.

“Our ambition is we should go Cranbourne Cup into the Pakenham Cup, so that would give us two solid weeks of concentrated promotion, advertising and awareness,” Bainbridge said.

“The Melbourne Spring Carnival is a great thing, it goes from the Caulfield Cup Carnival to the Cox Plate to the Melbourne Cup Carnival to the Southside Carnival, that’s our vision.

“You don’t always get your vision in year one, so we’ll put on two great shows and work towards it again the following year to get the Pakenham Cup a little bit closer to the spring.

“The preference would be the (last two Saturdays in November), that’s problematic because stand-alone Saturdays are hard to get and other clubs occupy them, so we respect that.

“If there’s not a willing opportunity we understand it’s going to be difficult but that’s our preference.

“Our motto out here is we want to fly the flag in spring, Christmas and summer, we want to get people engaged in racing at the right time of year and that’s where we’re going to concentrate and put our events on.”

• ‘He’s in the right form’: Buenos Noches primed for Newmarket

Bainbridge said ambitions for a $1m Cranbourne Cup – up from $500,000 – remained a future goal.

“Clearly our committee has an aspiration a Cranbourne Cup in the spring carnival could be a $1m,” Bainbridge said.

“Pretty well throughout every Saturday in the spring there’s a $1m race except for Cranbourne, we think it’s appropriate, we’re lobbying hard for that.”

Meanwhile, Bainbridge has a “unique race” planned for Good Friday night – March 29 – at Cranbourne restricted to Southside Racing trainers.

Bainbridge said six horses from Cranbourne and six trained out of Pakenham would contest the Good Friday Challenge, likely to be a 1200m or 1300m maiden or three-year-old handicap.

“We want to highlight and celebrate Southside Racing and also generate some funds for the Good Friday Appeal,” Bainbridge said.

Originally published as Racing Victoria to keep status quo for spring carnival schedule