By Ben Hope
THE Sandown Greyhound Racing Club will conduct a range of track works in the coming weeks, including a new track surface and the addition of middle-distance boxes.
As a result of the works there will be no races at Sandown after the Bert Bryant Memorial meeting on 11 March until the Henry Harrison Memorial meeting on 8 April.
Sandown racing and media manager Michael Floyd said the new track would be similar in colour to the track at The Meadows and help make a consistent surface across Greyhound Racing Victoria Venues.
“Punter’s won’t notice much of a difference,” Floyd said.
“Greyhound Racing Victoria are trying to standardise racing tracks to get a more consistent surface across all venues. As a punter you want consistent times across the board.”
“The Sandown track was reconstructed in 1995 and has remained the same since then.”
The works will replace the current surface with Burrumbeet sand, the same surface as currently in use at Ballarat, Warrnambool and recently installed at Warragul. Greyhound Racing Victoria will fund the track upgrades as well as the new starting boxes through their track maintenance funding.
Floyd said there were no problems with the current surface but a consistent approach across all racing venues would help with track maintenance.
“The current track at Sandown is still regarded as one of the safest in the country,” Floyd said.
“At this stage we are not sure if it will improve race times but it will be interesting to see what difference the new surface will make.”
The replacement of the track also offered the opportunity to replace the external track fence and install a dedicated eight-cage swabbing bay within the existing kennel block.
“Originally the track was going to be closed for two weeks but we decided to take the opportunity to make some other improvements,” Floyd said.
“We are going to put in a middle-distance start so we can hold 600 metre races as well as 515 and 715 metres. That meant we would need to be closed for an extra week.”
The new distance will mean Sandown can take advantage of a proposed Sky Channel expansion and hold an additional Sunday meeting.
“At the moment the Sky Channel have a proposal to create additional channels and we will be looking to help fill content. Thursday’s will continue to be our main meeting but we are hoping to add Sundays as well,” Floyd said.
The closure won’t affect any of the club’s major races and track will re-open in time for the Henry Harrison Memorial on 8 April.
Scheduled meetings have been transferred to The Meadows with the exception of the Thursday 1 April meeting that has been rescheduled to Cranbourne.
Greyhounds make way for works
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