Greyhound Racing NSW (GRNSW) is announcing today that racing at its city venue, Wentworth Park, will be paused this week in response to the continuing COVID-19 situation in Sydney.
The Wentworth Park meeting scheduled for Wednesday, July 14 has been transferred to Gosford, and the Wentworth Park meeting scheduled for Saturday, July 17, has been transferred to Bulli.
GRNSW will reassess the situation later in the week to see if further meetings need to be moved.
It was after much consideration and following the latest COVID-19 update from the NSW Government and NSW Health, GRNSW decided that in the best interests of all participants and staff, to temporarily cease racing in the city centre.
While there are concerns across the entire locked down area, the NSW Government and NSW Health have stipulated that their major concerns focus around areas in the Sydney Metropolitan region, particularly the South West, South and South East of the city.
As such, GRNSW believe it is best to keep all of our participants away from these areas by stopping them from travelling into the CBD to race at Wentworth Park.
The meeting at Gosford will be graded as provincial and will carry Wentworth Park Wednesday prizemoney, with 515m sprint events for 5th Grade and above, with prizemoney starting from $4,000 to the winner, and distance events for 5th Grade and above, with prizemoney starting from $4,400 to the winner. Maidens will be $1,500 to the winner and if the balance of the meeting needs to be made up of 388m events, they will carry prizemoney to the winner of $2,500 (5th Grade), $2,800 (4th Grade), and $3,000 (3rd Grade and above).
The Bulli meeting will be graded as city for 472m, 515m, and 590m races, and carry the traditional City Saturday prizemoney for all events over these distances to cater for normal Wentworth Park Saturday racing.
The programs for both meetings are on thedogs.com.au, with nominations closing for Wednesday's Gosford meeting at 11am on Monday, July 12, and nominations for the Saturday Bulli meeting closing at 9am on Wednesday, July 14.
Participants and staff must continue to adhere to all COVID-19 restrictions which have been put in place particularly across Greater Sydney, the Blue Mountains, Wollongong and the Central Coast.
We also urge everyone to check the list of exposure sites on the NSW Health website each day, and if you are deemed a close contact, you must seek a COVID-19 test and self-isolate for 14 days. If you are deemed a casual contact, you should do the same until receiving a negative COVID-19 test result.
Close and casual contacts should not attend race meetings. Those people must also provide the Greyhound Welfare & Integrity Commission (GWIC) with a negative COVID-19 test result and not attend a racecourse until such time as approval is given from GWIC to resume attendance.
Please do not attend a track if you have even the slightest cold or flu like symptoms.
