It’s been a long four years for Bong Bong Picnic Racing Club, which hasn’t hosted a meeting since 2019.
A bustling crowd was on hand on that particular day as Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott stole the show, winning their second Bong Bong Cup with the Ricky Blewitt-ridden Frenzied.
Since then, Bong Bong has been forced to make some tough decisions, with the COVID pandemic leading to back-to-back abandonments in 2020 and 2021.
Last year, the club was gearing up for a triumphant return to normality, but the weather gods had different plans in place, with Racing NSW and the Bong Bong Picnic Racing Club abandoning their race day.
While tomorrow is never guaranteed, Bong Bong committee members are working full steam ahead after being given the green light by Racing NSW‘s stewards to race on Friday, November 24.
The South East Racing Association club will prepare to host a 5000-plus crowd and the final NSW picnic meeting of 2023.
“It’s been interesting; the last few years have tested our committee,” Bong Bong Picnic Racing Club Secretary/Manager Peter Hales said.
“During COVID, we couldn’t do a great deal, and we simply couldn’t race; things looked good last year before the wet weather hit, and we couldn’t run.
“This year, we’re looking really good, but there has been a lot of work getting everything up to a good standard.”
Having not raced since 2019, there have been some teething problems, but nothing the club couldn’t overcome.
“We had to get all the televisions out, and whoever put them away put the cabling in another spot,” Hales laughed.
“We had to go through all those little things you don’t necessarily think about, but we are ready to go now.
“We’ve had five or six working bees, and they have been seven or eight hours on a Saturday, and we needed to because when you host an event this big, you can’t leave anything until the last minute.
“There were things that had to be looked at closely, but the place looks pretty good, and with a few final touches, we will be right to go by race day.”
With the support of their valued sponsors, Hales explained that the club was looking after patrons who have stuck by Bong Bong Picnic Racing Club in recent years, even honouring marquee and package prices offered two and three seasons ago.
“Our costs have gone through the roof,” Hales said.
“We have 90 marquees, and the cost of the hire of those marquees has gone up $40,000, and we have a lot of the people using marquees that booked three years ago, and we’ve honoured those prices,” Hales said.
“We’re wearing that cost, and we stuck with our deferred membership renewals, and we’ve looked after anyone that has booked to come to the races over the last three years.
“We won’t make a lot of money, but I expect this year to break even because we have plenty of sponsorship, approximately $80,000 to $90,000.”
Bong Bong Picnics has a long-standing and colourful history, with the club forming in 1986 before hosting its first meeting in 1887.
Over the years, some monstrous crowds have been on hand to witness trainers and owners of all levels try and win the time-honoured Bong Bong Cup.
As one would expect, there have been plenty of stories to come out of what is arguably Australia’s most famous picnic meeting.
Still, since the 1990s, the meeting, which is only open to its members and guests, has found a happy medium, welcoming anywhere from 5000 to 7000 patrons to each race day.
“It is members and their guests only, but we’ve made it very easy, and we don’t want to stop people from coming to the races,” Hales said.
“We’ve made it that members can invite another four people, and that is flexible, and if you are a member and you’ve got a crowd of ten friends, and you can handle them, then we’re okay with that.
“It’s not like it used to be; you could write a book about Bong Bong picnics and what went on in the 80s, but we’ve moved on from there, and it’s a really good day.”
Hales, a stalwart of the club, has many younger faces around him these days, and he said a new-look committee was always working hard to ensure the meeting was the best it could be.
“We’re in between the city and county, and we are a little bit bigger than most of the picnics and bigger than some of the jockey clubs and community clubs,” Hales said.
“It’s a big task, but our committee is keen and ready to race.
“The committee is now a lot younger, and over the last five years, we lost two chairmans and a vice chairman and a lot of the older members of the committee have moved on, and we’ve got many new faces involved.
“It’s a big event, but the racing still comes first, and we’ve got a farrier on the committee who works for Tash Burleigh, and we’ve got others who are right into racing, so it’s very much about the racing being the centre of our event.”
Hales has worked hard to ensure that many bookmakers will be on hand, and punters will be overjoyed to know that 31 will be taking bets on the day.
“We get good support for our race day,” Hales said.
“I know Adrian Bott and company have booked a marquee, and Waterhouse is running his book on the day.
“We’ve got 31 bookmakers booked in; they all break their necks to get here.
“We only have 28 stands available, and that’s all we could put in, but we’ve opened up some new areas for the ones that can stand alone, who bring their owner generator and gear, and that’s how we can host an extra three.”
It will be a massive day at Bong Bong, with gates opening at 10 am before the opening ceremony at noon.
Racing jumps at 1 pm, and from there, it’s on for young and old, with the six-race card and bumper fashions on the field competition set to keep the big crowd entertained.
Readers can click here to learn more about Bong Bong Picnic Racing Club and how to apply for membership and race day passes.
