Trackwork at Sydney’s Randwick racecourse will go ahead this month but race meetings and barrier trial sessions set down for the track have had to be moved ahead of the planned return for Epsom day.
Corrosion of structural steel cabling in sections of the roof of the Queen Elizabeth II Stand has the site currently unsafe to host meetings.
On Friday it was announced that sections at the front of the QEII stand roof would be removed in a move to have the venue safe to host its flagship spring meeting on October 1 which features four Group Ones including the running of the Epsom Handicap.
Australian Turf Club chief executive Darren Pearce said a 20-day work program had started.
The Group One George Main Stakes day on Saturday week has been transferred from Randwick to Rosehill.
“We need to give the builders the uninterrupted work program to deliver in 20 days which is what we will do,” Pearce said.
“Trackwork will go on but barrier trials and midweek races will be transferred away so builders have 20 days to deliver the site for Epsom Super Saturday.”
The meeting set down for September 21 on Randwick’s Kensington track has been moved to Warwick Farm and the official two-year-old barrier trial session on September 19 has been moved to Canterbury.
A barrier trial session on September 16 has been cancelled.
AAP TURF
