Racing’s first lady argues galloping on the course proper at Canterbury is so good, the Australian Turf Club could be charging for the privilege.
Gai Waterhouse says the outing “works in a massive way” for her stable after she took a truckload of horses from Randwick to the suburban track on Tuesday.
Paul Snowden and Blake Shinn have also backed the initiative of the Australian Turf Club to permit morning track work on two Tuesdays in August to help horses begin their spring carnival campaigns.
“You get a crack with your horses at an excellent track and an excellent surface and it gives (the horses) a raceday experience by coming in the float and being in the stalls,” Waterhouse told Sky Sports Radio.
“They could charge a galloping fee – I think it’d be a nice little earn and it’s a lovely way of the public coming.”
Waterhouse and Paul Snowden, who took a small contingent including Invader to Canterbury on Tuesday, both compared the exercise to what Moonee Valley offers trainers in the lead-up to the Cox Plate meeting.
“We were 12 metres off the fence but it’s a good exercise,” Snowden said.
“We’ve spent a lot of time in Melbourne doing these sort of little things when horses need that little bit extra to get out of the gallop.
“They think they are going to the races when you put them on a float.”
NSW Trainers Association chief executive Glenn Burge has foreshadowed further discussions with the ATC to open up more opportunities for trainers and jockeys to use Canterbury in the spring.
The track is the only one of four Sydney metropolitan venues that is not a training centre.
