The first race meeting of the year was original scheduled for last Saturday but was postponed due to the big wet that delivered massive rainfall in North West Queensland last weekend.

Then organisers tried to reschedule the first Mount Isa Race Club non-Tab race meeting for Saturday March 10.

Unfortunately too that race meet has been abandoned by QRIC Stewards following due consideration due to a number of factors including weather/state of the track.

Since last Saturday, Mount Isa’s Buchanan Park racecourse has received a further 120mm of rainfall making the track again unsuitable for racing.

That means they will try again next weekend for the St Patrick’s Day races, which is always a popular event, and was scheduled to be the second meet of the year.

However as a result of the abandonment and the limited opportunities trainers have had to work horses in the past 10 days, there have been amendments to the race program originally scheduled for the next Mount Isa Race Club meeting on Saturday March 17. 

The majority of these amendments are alterations to distances, which will be shortened. 

The amended race program for Mount Isa RC next Saturday is:

Open Plate (sw)                                1000m                   (distance was previously 1100m)

Benchmark 65 Handicap                1000m                   (no change)

Benchmark 60 Hcp                           900m                    (distance was previously 1200m)

Rating Band 0-50 Handicap          1000m                   (class was previously Benchmark 50 Hcp)

QTIS Maiden Plate

(2yo & up sw)                                    900m                    (distance was previously 1000m and QTIS funding now added)

Nominations for this meeting will close at 11am on Tuesday March 13. 

Racing Queensland have said they will be “aggressive” with divisions of races if there are excess horses in any of the races.