RJC racecourse manager Trent Williams reported surface was ‘quite good’

With just over $500,000 in prize money on offer at Thursday’s giant RJC 12-race TAB card, organisers have their fingers crossed that the weather gods will be kind. Read the latest on the track rating.

A record-breaking 12-race TAB card will be run at Rockhampton’s Callaghan Park on Thursday.

With the consensus of opinion of forecasters of “little to any rain and the possibility of a late shower (Thursday)”, it seems that the weather gods won’t sour history in the making at Rockhampton’s Callaghan Park racecourse.

With records due to be smashed by the giant RJC 12-race TAB card, misty drizzle (light rain) over Callaghan Park had brought about 3mms on Wednesday morning which, on top of the previous falls in recent weeks, was the last thing wanted.

About noon Wednesday, racecourse manager Trent Williams was out “walking the beat” on the Callaghan Park turf track.

“Actually, the surface is quite good. We had 1.5mm here early this morning and another 1.5mm since,” he said.

“It is just misty drizzle. If we were to race on it now, it would be rated a Soft 5.

“I did a penetrometer reading on it just before and it recorded 5.6.

“If this misty rain continues throughout today, I will say it would be rated in the Soft 6 range on Thursday. It just depends.”

For the record, a penetrometer is an internationally used instrument to measure the hardness of a racetrack.

It is recognised as being objective and reliable in correlating with race times.

It measures depth of penetration of a shaft into the turf after dropping a weight from a set height.

The news from Williams and the likelihood of little more rain had the Rockhampton Jockey Club and racing stakeholders involved with Thursday’s historic occasion confidently cautious of a successful outcome.

Williams and his track staff have moved the running rail out six metres around the entire course since the Friday, April 5, meeting which was run on a heavy track.

As has been broadly publicised, Thursday’s record meeting features the transfer of three races from the abandoned Saturday, April 6, feature card at Callaghan Park.

Those crucial races for Capricornia Yearling Sale graduates offer in totality $266,000 in prize money and have attracted horses from throughout Queensland.

All in all, just over $500,000 in prize money is on offer at Thursday’s Callaghan Park meeting which, in itself, is another record.

At lunchtime on Wednesday, only eight horses had been scratched from the program, meaning 128 remained to chase the big dollars.

Meanwhile, Keppel Park, Yeppoon where racing is set for Saturday was rated a Soft 6 early on Wednesday.

Williams said the track had received 14mm of rain overnight and up to mid-morning Wednesday.

The weather forecast for Yeppoon is a “shower or two” for Thursday with 0-5mm of rain, a partly cloudy day Friday with no rain and only a slight chance of a shower on Saturday.

Originally published as RJC racecourse manager Trent Williams reported surface was ‘quite good’