THE majestic elm trees spread their arms in welcome, a light north-easterly breeze wafted in, the sun was shining, the beer was cold… and the action on the famous picnic racing track was close and exciting.
It was simply a perfect day for the Woolamai Races last Saturday and the ideal venue to start your New Year’s Eve celebrations.
A feature of the day on the track was the treble of race wins by Woolamai regular Melinda McDonald, all of them tight finishes, on Rue Lepic in Race One, Dustin Dhahran in Race Five and See It All in the last, Race seven.
And the day also featured the breakthrough win by jockey Tyson Barton who admitted afterwards that despite riding at Woolamai 15 to 20 times he’d never posted a victory.
All that changed when he just got the better of Melinda on Relyonbella in Race Two to boot home Main Beach by half a length and then he promptly backed that up with his second race win at Woolamai, on Mulaa Man for trainer Jackson Pallot of Bairnsdale.
“I only picked that ride up last night, so pretty happy,” said Barton in the winners’ circle after.
“I’ve had winners at most of the picnic tracks but for some reason, I haven’t had much luck at Woolamai. That’s changed.
“Yes, the track’s good. A bit of give in it for the horses and everyone gets a crack at it,” said the Kilmore rider.
Woolamai’s second race meeting for the season featured a number of tribute and memorial races including the fourth running of the Mickey Gordon Island Dash for the award-winning Age journalist who died while taking part in the Cowes Classic in February 2018. A resident of Woolamai, he dabbled in racehorse ownership, loved the local course at Woolamai and also surfing on nearby Phillip Island.
Race Four was the Rodney McAllister Memorial over 2008 metres in memory of the Woolamai and District Racing Club’s longest-serving committeeman who passed away a few days before the 2020 running of the Woolamai Cup.
Rod devoted 50 years to the service of the racing club and recreation reserve committees.
And the tears flowed for local Bass resident and regular racecourse reveller Rhonda Evans who passed away suddenly in late November.
A well-known employee at Woolworths in Wonthaggi, she was a tennis fanatic, both on the local scene and annually at Victorian Country Week, being honoured by her friends last Saturday in fitting style with the running of the Rhonda ‘Our Champagne Lady’ Trophy race, won in thrilling fashion by Melinda McDonald.
Speaking at the presentations, tennis partner and racing friend Leanne du Plessis said Rhonda was a loved friend who would be very sadly missed.
In fact, the race day had a bit of everything with popular jockey Caitlin King scoring a breakthrough win on Eevavessance for Ensay trainer Rob Gillahan and the connections, after 20 unsuccessful tries at mainly mountain racetracks from Tumut and Cooma to Swifts Creek and Woolamai.
King saluted the crowd as she brought Eevavessance back to scale, acknowledging she was lucky enough to hold off the fast-finishing Silent Charge after stealing a break on the field in the straight.
“She’s just lasted but that’s all she’s got to do,” said Caitlin, also noting the mare was quite a character to ride.
Woolamai now turns its attention to the next summer holiday meeting on Saturday, January 14 followed by the Woolamai Cup meeting on Saturday, January 28 and the ‘Riding for the Disabled’ activities that will be a feature of the Saturday, February 18 meeting.
It’s all happening at Woolamai.
