Raceday return could bring Waipukurau a financial boost, next Hastings racing Spring Carnival is in 2026

Racing at the Waipukurau racecourse in 2019. The course is being brought back into raceday use for three cup-class meetings in the 2025-26 season, while punters wait for the reinstatement of the Hastings racecourse. Photo / NZME

Waipukurau may have struck gold with at least three of Hawke’s Bay’s biggest cup race meetings expected to be held on the town’s racecourse over the next year.

It comes with the announcement that racing in the Bay will return with three days of racing at the Waipukurau Jockey Club’s course in 2025-26, pending the reopening of the Hastings track in time for Hawke’s Bay Racing Inc (HBR) crown jewel, the Spring Carnival, in September-October next year.

It starts on November 16 (a Sunday) with the 1600 metres Waipukurau Cup, which dates back at least as far as 1859, has been raced in Hastings in recent years and was last raced in November at Woodville, with stakes of $25,000.

The 2100m Wairoa Cup, first raced over 140 years ago and last held in Hastings 15 months ago, for stakes of $40,000, is expected to be raced at Waipukurau on February 15, a Sunday.

But Wairoa Racing Club president Paul Toothill, who is fighting for the reinstatement of racing at the town’s Te Kupenga racecourse, learned of the plans only through media and is yet to discuss it with his committee.

The Wairoa Cup was to have been raced this year at South Wairarapa course Tauherenikau, but neither the club nor the town’s businesses supported the venture because of the disconnect between their event and the fact it would be raced on a track 380km away.

The biggest prize for Waipukurau is the 2200m Hawke’s Bay Cup, with a history dating back to 1860, and which had stakes of $120,000 when raced at Trentham last month. It will be raced next at Waipukurau next April 26.

Waipukurau’s good fortune was announced by Waipukurau club president Kirsty Lawrence on Wednesday, ahead of an HBR meeting in Hastings at which horse owners, trainers and members were told racing should return to the Hastings track in time for the 2026 Spring Carnival.

Well over $1 million is expected to be spent on cambering and other track correction work, which HBR and New Zealand Thoroughbred Racing say will sustain racing in Hawke’s Bay well into the future.

The benefits for Waipukurau have been highlighted by the manager and part-owner of the Leopard Hotel (aka Waipukurau Hotel).

Taj Singh said past owners have told him its nine rooms and three-roomed family suite are likely to be booked out on at least one night for each of the race meetings.

Opened in 1963 and thus a host of racing visitors for almost 60 years, it is otherwise only fully booked about once every two months, he said, and it relies on big events.

Mayor Alex Walker was unavailable for comment by Thursday afternoon.

Doug Laing is a senior reporter based in Napier with Hawke’s Bay Today, and has 52 years of journalism experience, 42 of them in Hawke’s Bay, in news gathering, including breaking news, sports, local events, issues, and personalities.