GIVEN the soaking rain over the past 24 hours, and the forecast of further heavy rains over the coming weekend, the prognosis for racing to go ahead at Greyville on Saturday is extremely poor.
Against that background, and in the best interests of all affected parties and stakeholders, Gold Circle has decided to postpone the Super Saturday race meeting, featuring the eLan Property Group Gold Cup and three other Grade 1 races, in its entirety to Saturday 1 August.
The race meeting originally scheduled for 1 August will now take place on Sunday 2 August.
“With the support of Event World and all our service providers we are pleased to confirm that all marquee infrastructure will remain at Greyville for the delayed race meeting thus affording the 17 Charities the opportunity to continue with their much needed fund-raising activities on 1 August,” said Racing and Marketing Executive Graeme Hawkins.
“All bookings in the various venues will also be transferred to the new date and Gold Circle would appreciate clients advising the company of any cancellations,” added Hawkins.
“The decision to postpone was not made lightly as we are well aware that the official NHA statistics, which determine the Championship in respect of various categories such as Champion Stallion, Champion Breeders, Champion Trainer, Champion Jockey etc will be finalized when the Season closes on 31 July, ” said Hawkins.
Fortunately the Championship in respect of the Trainer and Jockey is a done deal, with Sean Tarry and Gavin Lerena holding unassailable leads, but Super Saturday could have played a major role in other categories – in particular the General Sires Log, which now seems likely to be headed by Captain Al.
The Equus Awards panel will however consider the performances of horses running on Super Saturday when voting on the outcome of the various equine categories which are not governed by official NHA statistics.
The ever popular Gold Circle Racing Masters golf tournament at the Wild Coast Sun, which has attracted a record entry of 110 golfing enthusiasts from amongst the racing fraternity, will go ahead as planned from Sunday 26 to Wednesday 29 July.
“The long term weather forecast for next week is good with sunshine predicted from Monday all the way through to Sunday 2 August,” concluded Hawkins.
