Dual gallops, harness racing meet at Kilcoy a first for Queensland

A CAPACITY crowd will be seeing double at Kilcoy on Sunday when the club holds its first dual gallops and harness meeting.

Minister Steve Dickson and Racing Queensland chief executive Darren Condon. Picture: Russell Brown.

A CAPACITY crowd will be seeing double at Kilcoy on Sunday when the club holds its first dual gallops and harness meeting.

Six trotting trials have been held on the track and club president Con Searle said drivers gave the surface a big tick of approval.

"A big advantage we have is the 800m chute, which gives them a long run to the first turn,'' Searle said. "A few said they would like all tracks to be like that.''

This will be the first dual code grass track meeting covered by Sky Channel and the TAB in Queensland.

Chief executive Darren Condon said Racing Queensland was keen to build a grass track harness racing series.

"We've had a lot of interest from the country clubs and we see this as a great way for regional communities to connect with the sport of harness racing,'' he said.

The next leg in the series is likely to be held at Esk in the New Year.

Searle hopes Sunday will be successful enough to become an annual event. He said he first toyed with the idea of having trot races at Kilcoy when the club was cut back to just two gallop meetings a year.

Searle mentioned the idea to Warwick Stansfield, from the Queensland Harness Racing Board, last October and from there the wheels were set in motion.

Kilcoy was given the go-ahead in July and Searle and his committee have been working towards this day ever since.