Nearly 78 per cent ($2.4 million) of the 2017 Luxbet Tasmanian Summer Racing Carnival (TSRC) stakes were won by Tasmanian horses.
Tasracing chief executive officer Vaughn Lynch said this was broadly in line with last year’s result when $2.36 million of carnival stakes (or 80 per cent) stayed in Tasmania.
“The racing throughout the carnival was excellent and demonstrated, once again, that Tasmanian-bred and trained horses can compete against interstate horses that target our carnival,” he said.
“This is particularly evident when you consider that only six of the feature races were won by interstate horses.”
Leading interstate trainers Darren Weir (who trained the Luxbet Launceston Cup winner Big Duke), Robert Smerdon, Patrick Payne, Lee and Anthony Freedman and David and Ben Hayes, and Tom Dabernig were all represented at the carnival this summer.
Mr Lynch said Northwest Passage won both the Hobart Guineas and the Tasmanian Derby and, trained by leading trainer Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott, looked destined for bigger things.
“Young Cranbourne trainer Matthew Brown won his first Group 3 race when Kiss Me Ketut led throughout to win the Vamos Stakes,” he said.
Bill Ryan’s impressive filly Pateena Arena (Needs Further) made a clean sweep of the black type 2YO races.
Star Tasmanian filly Hot Dipped just missed the Tasmanian Guineas, Strutt Stakes and Tasmanian Oaks trifecta narrowly going down in the Oaks to the Darren Weir trained Parthesia.
Mr Lynch said Hellova Street’s wins in the Luxbet Thomas Lyons and Mowbray Stakes was an outstanding achievement.
The 2017 Luxbet TSRC featured 11 race meetings between 6 January and 22 February.
There were 96 races and prize money totaling almost $3.1 million on offer.
| 2015/2016 | 2016/2017 | |||
| 8th January – 24th February 2016 | 6th January – 22nd February 2017 | |||
| Meetings | 11 | Meetings | 11 | |
| Races | 92 | Races | 96 | |
| Av. Runners | 10.67 | Av. Runners | 10.53 | |
| Int. Runners | 40 | Int. Runners | 42 | |
| Total Prizemoney | $2,903,000.00 | Total Prizemoney | $3,090,000.00 | |
| Interstate | $542,774.00 | Interstate | $688,226.00 | |
| % | 18.7% | % | 22.3% | |
| Local | $2,360,226.00 | Local | $2,401,774.00 | |
| % | 81.3% | % | 77.7% | |