Woodville Racing Club furious at planned cutbacks

All eyes were on the horses as they headed down the home straight at Woodville during last month's Cup meeting.

If the racing board goes ahead and cuts back race days for the Woodville-Pahiatua Racing Club, it would be touch-and-go if the club would remain viable, secretary Paula McCool says.

The New Zealand Racing Board has put out its draft calendar for the next racing season which begins in August, scratching all but four of the country club's race days.

"They've been steadily dropping our race meetings," Paula told the Dannevirke News.

"Last year we had five and previously seven meetings.

"It will be touch-and-go if it would be viable for our club to operate with just four meetings a year."

Paula said the club needs two race meetings just to pay its huge insurance bill.

"It would be a huge shame if Tararua lost its only racing club, but we're not the only small club facing this challenge," she said.

"We've put in a submission for the March meeting of the racing board, but in the past our submissions have fallen on deaf ears.

"Woodville is such a good track, superior to many other bigger clubs, but with fewer horses on the racing scene, the racing board is having to reduce meetings."

Racing club member Pat Shannon said she's furious the racing board are giving meeting dates to clubs she believes aren't making a go of things.

"Why prop up clubs losing money hand over fist? We're a great club with awesome support from our community and cutting meetings isn't fair on small clubs who are the backbone of racing in this country."

What is galling for the Woodville-Pahiatua Club is that membership is increasing and sponsors are on board. And Paula said she doesn't think many of the members will make the effort to travel to other clubs for their day at the races.

But club officials aren't giving up without a fight to save the club, which has been part of the racing history of our district and New Zealand for more than 130 years.

"Woodville has been a huge centre for racing and if you asked an Aucklander about Woodville, they'd likely say 'where?'. But ask an Australian and they'd say 'where all the good horses come from'."

"We've written to Racing Minister Nathan Guy asking him to meet with us and we're waiting to hear back," Paula said.

"And we've written to all the other smaller clubs such as Waipukurau to get their support."

Last year at the club's rural race day New Zealand First leader Winston Peters told the Dannevirke News there would be no future for racing in New Zealand without country clubs.

"There's no future without clubs such as this because the racing fan base is built up province by province," he said at the time.

"This is a $1.8 billion industry and it's suffering from a lack of Government support. Sadly too many politicians only see the glamour side of race day, if they got up at 4am with a shovel they'd know the real racing industry."