By Kath Gannaway
Healesville Amateur Racing Club has been recognised as the Picnic Racing Club of the Year at Country Racing Victoria’s Picnic Racing Club awards.
HARC president David Purcell accepted the award on behalf of the committee and members at the awards night at Cranbourne on Saturday, 21 May.
Mr Purcell said the club was thrilled to receive the award, which is judged on a range of criteria from track conditions and improvements made to how the club performs during the season, fields and attendance.
“We’re pretty chuffed; this comes after quite a few good years, and a good season, despite the fact that we lost the Derby Day meeting to bad weather this year.
“It’s a great thing for the club, the committee and all the volunteers for all the effort everyone puts in,” Mr Purcell said.
Mr Purcell said the club runs on the dedication and hard work put in by volunteers such as Margaret Allard, a member he said had been the main driver behind establishing and maintaining the beautiful flowerbeds.
“It’s those little things in the end that set you apart from the other clubs when you’re being judged for the award,” he said.
Affordable entry fees and free activities for children, along with feature events such as the Fashions on the Field at the Healesville Cup meeting all add to the attraction for families.
Mr Purcell mentioned members Ivan Allen and Peter Hodgson, whose work on track maintenance was critical to the ability of the club to meet the standards required by Country Racing Victoria.
The condition of the track is a huge factor in attracting the best of the country racing trainers and jockeys to the meetings, including Barry Goodwin who won Trainer of the Year and jockey Courtney Pace who is a popular regular at Healesville and took out the Jockey Premiership at the awards.
Mr Purcell also noted the work secretary Chris Young had done as secretary co-ordinating bookings and growing the marquee market, which has contributed over the past few years to consistently good attendance numbers and the great atmosphere that brings local people back to every race meeting and attracts thousands of visitors to Healesville.
If there is a hurdle the club would like to get over, it’s the gap between their six race meetings early in the year, but that’s in the hands of Picnic Racing Victoria.
The current set up of the Picnic Racing calendar doesn’t allow for another race meeting for Healesville with the 33 meetings allocated to picnic racing clubs throughout Victoria.
Gary Buckley, Manager of Picnic Racing for CRV congratulated the club on the win saying the club has been pro-active in promoting race meetings and had attracted both good attendances and good fields throughout the season.
He paid tribute to the volunteer committee, saying the role was not just about attracting crowds but entailed a lot of responsibility.
Any chance of the club attracting a seventh meeting was not, however, on the agenda, Mr Buckley said.
“There are 33 races allocated each year and Healesville has prime dates,” he said.
“They have a guarantee for three of six race dates … and they deserve it.”
The success of the club is a welcome double-edged sword for Chris Young, who says he is getting inquiries already for the pre-Christmas meetings on 2 and 16 December.
The 2017 season starts with the Derby Day meeting on 4 November with 2018 dates 13 January, 10 February and 7 April.
