Queensland trainers want compensation for runners at the Beaudesert meeting, claiming they were misled about the condition of the track.
Trainers, jockeys, owners and punters have been scathing in their criticism of the Beaudesert track which deteriorated badly on Wednesday.
It was the third meeting in 10 days at Beaudesert which has had to take some of the load caused by the closure of Eagle Farm.
Beaudesert was originally rated a soft 5 on Wednesday but was downgraded to a soft 6 after race four with jockeys saying the track played more like a heavy 8.
The Queensland branch of the Australian Trainers Association will meet with Racing Queensland on Monday afternoon and seek action including compensation.
QATA secretary Cameron Partington said the Beaudesert situation came three weeks after a similar embarrassing instance at Ipswich.
“Once again it has our racing industry’s professionalism and credibility in question,” Partington said.
Partington said the QATA would like to see compensation for connections who travelled to Beaudesert to race on a soft 5, on a warm drying day, only to find they had been grossly misled.
“We understand that this will not be easy to work out, so a blanket compensation should be given to all runners who attended and to those that scratched in refund of fees etc,” he said.
Partington said after race one jockeys advised the track was more like a heavy 8 with margins in the second race placings fourth to ninth between 10-27 lengths.
“Surely it was evidence, yet it was not until after race four that a downgrade to a soft 6 occurred,” Partington said.
“So the fact is glaringly obvious that the rating issued at 6.43am of a soft 5 was grossly incorrect. And this needs to be investigated as to how this happened.”
“But more importantly when the stewards arrived and took control of the meeting why could they not have seen the concerns and reassessed the track condition before issuing a new rating advising trainers of the mistake and calling for new scratchings.”
