Benalla race meeting called off after rain

A race meeting at Benalla in country Victorian has been called off and subsequently rescheduled because of the state of the surface after morning rain.

Racing Victoria has announced the meeting will be rescheduled for Sunday, with nominations to be retaken and close on Wednesday.

After a 1230 track inspection, stewards called Monday’s meeting off because of large areas of surface water on the track, stemming from 13mm of rain since approximately 7am.

“This amount of rain was not forecast to hit the area until later in the day, and the forecast was for 34 degrees, so the club had irrigated yesterday on this basis,” Racing Victoria’s racing operations manager, Paul Bloodworth, said.

“In light of the comments received by jockeys and stewards following today’s inspections, there was no other option other than to abandon today’s meeting.”