Thousands of racing fans turned out in style for the annual Ipswich Cup – despite a fire threatening to disrupt the event the night before.
Fire crews were called to the Bundamba track, west of Brisbane, on Friday night after a small electrical fire ignited in the Ipswich Turf Club’s old grandstand.
Thankfully the blaze did not do any substantial damage and punters were able to arrive at the track for the major event on Queensland’s racing calendar as planned on Saturday.
Large crowds of racegoers thronged to the venue dressed to the nines and enjoyed a day of clear skies and sunshine, with temperatures reaching a maximum of 20C.
Even the attending police officers could be seen joining in on the fun as they posed for happy snaps with jubilant racegoers.
However, the day was not all smiles with one guest seen being seen led away by officers.
For those who were actually paying attention to what happened on the track, the feature race – the $250,000 2150m Ipswich Cup – was taken out by Queensland horse Red Wave, ridden by jockey Angela Jones.
The five-year-old progeny of Red Dazzler ran an almost perfect race sitting just behind the leaders for the most of the event.
Winning trainer Tony Sears said the win was one for his daughter and training partner Maddysen who he said deserved all the kudos.
‘Maddysen does all the work with this horse, all credit goes to her,’ Sears said.
‘We thought about it a little while back. He put in one real bad run at Brisbane the other day on a wet track, which he doesn’t really like.
‘(But) we were pretty confident without saying too much because he had no weight on a dry track.’