perko
Just got back from the Birdsville Races , fielded there as a bush bookie , Drove in on the Bedourie Road through driving rain the last 200kms and got in on Thursday morning - shut all roads in that arvo. Racetrack is located 3 kms south of Birdsville on a claypan sitting between sandhills . Track got 55 mm off rain on it Thursday arvo and night and looking at it on Friday parts of it had 1 metre of floodwater over it in several parts off it , in fact it looked like a shallow lake. Well no racing this weekend everyone thought except for the Birdsvillians . On Friday morning Diamantina Shire works foreman Trevor ''Colgate '' Stewart jumped in his excavator and proceded to drain the track , how , well this how it happened . 20 metres inside the inside running rail he digs 20 odd 3 metre deep holes through the sunbaked top of the claypan into a sandy base , then he digs a 1 metre deep trench back to the running rail which drain the water back to the 3 metre trenches which never fill up , they act like sinkholes and by late Friday arvo the track had not a drop off water on it but 3 inches of muddy clay remained over the entire circumference. Saturday his work crew graded the entire track and front end loaders and bobcats dumped the muddy clay over the inside running rail . A few hours of Sunday sun and wind and by 11am you got a lightning fast bush dirt track entirely safe for racing . Throw in the 3000 who made it out to Birdsville , Josh Flemmings call , close hard bush racing , 11 bookies who bet down by jump time to 115 % , characters everywhere [ Peter Moody/ Fred Brophy who are treated like royalty out here] haggling bookies for top odds and what you get is a pounding exiting race atmosphere not often seen on racetracks in Australia , a must get to meeting for any racing enthusiast . PS Betting 1/3 and 1/4 place odds in 115% jump prices saw the place % under 200 and 300 in all 11 races , can see why most books have gone to 1/4 and 1/5 these days , won handily on the win betting but done a fair bit on the place component as the margin in it was to looking figures, highly competitive betting ring at the the Big Shed on the Sand dune
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