Birds were liberated from the 16 Mile Gums rest area, south of Hay, with the first event held on August 3.
Two hundred and sixty-six birds were liberated by 13 trainers in the event, and it was Echuca’s Rod Clark who took overall race honours.
Clark’s birds made the over 157km journey to his loft in a time of 1:51:10, representing an average velocity of 1413.36 metres per minute.
C, R and D Robb of Echuca placed second with a velocity of 1402.92, while Moama’s M and P Racing (1370.11) took third.
Kyabram’s Peter White (1353.88), Rochester’s Ian Trench (1333.79), Echuca’s Andrew ‘Bear’ Williamson (1266.97), and Echuca’s Steve Bourke (1119.767) rounded out the top seven.
The following week, on August 10, trainers took to the course again, with 12 trainers releasing 224 birds from the same liberation point.
Conditions slowed down the field across the board, but it was Clark who once again came away with the win, this time with a velocity of 1137.3.
Williamson grabbed the second-best velocity (1134.44), while C, R and D Robb (1128.54) had to settle for third place.
M and P Racing (1101.78) earned fourth place, while Trench (1092.28), Kyabram’s Gary Rayner (1056.2), and Phillip King (1010.5), took the remaining top seven places.
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