RV announces city prize money increases

After a successful spring carnival, Racing Victoria has announced additional funds have been allocated for prize money increases.

RV announced on Friday prize money for two and three-year-old races and open handicaps at Saturday metropolitan meetings will increase to $100,000 from February 1.

The increases are stage one in a review of prize money in Victoria after Racing NSW introduced minimum stakes of $100,000 at Saturday metropolitan meetings in October.

Outgoing RV chief executive Bernard Saundry said RV was pleased with results from this year’s spring carnival which saw increases in turnover and attendance.

“As a result we are in a position to reward a broad range of stakeholders for their valuable contributions,” Saundry said.

“The increase ensures that owners and trainers are both rewarded for campaigning their horses in Melbourne and have confidence to invest at the upcoming yearling sales.

“This announcement marks the commencement of a strategic review into our prize money model which will continue through the first quarter of 2017 and ultimately inform our decisions on further prize money increases for the 2017-18 racing season.”

In total RV announced $5 million in additional funding with $3 million going towards prizemoney.

The three metropolitan clubs will split $1.5 million based on their percentage of metropolitan turnover while $500,000 will be paid to Country Racing Victoria to assist in important capital projects.

“Our metropolitan and country clubs play a central role in ensuring the spring racing carnival is a showpiece event for Australian sport,” Saundry said.