But Echuca Racing Club president Troy Murphy says the success of the day depends on more changes on COVID-19 restrictions.
Murphy said if the club cannot have spectators, the biggest day of its calendar will take a serious financial hit.
Clubs which have had their meetings cancelled to give Echuca regional exclusivity on November 3 are Cranbourne, Bairnsdale, Wangaratta and Mildura.
But Murphy said it wasn’t all plain sailing. The club’s Friday race meeting on October 23 – the AFL Grand Final Eve public holiday – has been punted to make way for the Benalla Gold Cup.In its place, Echuca has been given October 26 – the following Monday.
“It’s all still up in the air – at the very least we are hoping horse owners and ERC members will be allowed in by Melbourne Cup day,” Murphy said of COVID-19 restrictions.
“At the moment we can’t even send out membership accounts because we can’t get anyone into the track.
“We are luckier than a lot of regional clubs, we are in a pretty healthy financial position, but that can’t last forever.”
The Pavilion, one of the club’s year-round cash, flows has been closed since the pandemic started and looks like staying that way until the end of November at the earliest.
Despite dramatic falls in locked down Melbourne’s COVID case numbers – and virtually none in regional Victoria - Premier Daniel Andrews is showing no sign of softening his deadlines.“Until we know where we stand with crowds the Pavilion remains closed,” Murphy said.
“Even at four square metres per person its capacity shrinks from 300 to barely 100.
“And even if we are allowed that kind of crowd access the sheer cost of staffing the club on public holiday rates would have us really sharpening the pencil to see if the costs stack up.“It’s like throwing darts in the dark, very frustrating; we can’t even try to organise anything without some clear deadlines.”
Racing Victoria’s Greg Carpenter said its operations team would continue to review the program through late October and early November to see if there were additional changes required for horses impacted by the cancellation of the community race days during that period.
Carpenter said in consultation with Country Racing Victoria and clubs “we have made the difficult decision to remove a further nine meetings from the country racing calendar throughout October and early November”.
“I would also like to make particular mention of the iconic Gunbower, Manangatang and Wycheproof Cup meetings, all cancelled; and note we’ll be working closely with CRV and clubs to ensure these meetings return in style in 2021,” the executive general manager (racing) said.
RV and CRV have confirmed the cancelled meetings will not be rescheduled to another date within the 2020-21 season.