The club received more than 300 nominations for Friday’s Cup meeting and Saturday’s non-TAB meeting, prompting club secretary Kevin Ferrier to consider the possibility of running two Ron Martin Memorial Maidens on Friday.

“We got 47 noms for the Maiden,” Ferrier said

yesterday.

“If we got 30 acceptances we’d have to look at splitting it again and running a nine-race card.

“It’s the most nominations we’ve ever had. 210 on Friday and another 102 for Saturday.

“We thought we’d have good nominations because of all the wet weather but didn’t think it would be this big.

“The track is a Dead 4 at the moment and if we can get a bit of good weather it’s going to be a huge two days.

“We’ve never had 102 on the Saturday before – 60 is the most we’ve ever had.”

While 47 maiden nominations is huge, the club would hope for 30 acceptances before splitting the famous Ron Martin Maiden.

It did that in 2003 when Scorpion Dancer won the first division for owner-trainer Peter Shanahan and Rebelette won the second division for then Tamworth trainer Tim Martin.

Rebelette beat the Bill “Bot” Thompson-trained Purse Strings, which came back and won the race the year after.

Ferrier said the 29 Walcha Cup nominations were also a great response.

“Having 29 in that as well is huge,” he said.

“And it’s a quality field. Last year’s winner Prior Baron is nominated and he appears to be in much the same form as last year and has been running well in good company.”

2009 Cup winner Blinkin Easy is also among the

nominations.

“He’s coming back from 2000m though,” Ferrier said.

“That’s going to be tough but Ruth (trainer Ruth Cooper) is a very smart trainer.”

He said the likes of Slick Sniper (Tracey Bartley), All Again (Lesley Jeffriess), and Glen Innes Cup winner Zigzag add to the depth of the race.

He said the club committee completed a final working bee at the track on the weekend where two new hosing docks were built and the main bar area painted.

“We’ve had a bit of work going on,” Ferrier said.

“We’ve smartened everything up.

“We just need the weather. They are predicting a bit of rain, some storms – hopefully we can dodge it all.”