Smoken Up obliterated the Australasian record in winning the Len Smith Mile in a time of 1:51.9 taking almost a full second off the 1:52.8 set by Pay Me Christian in winning the 2006 Newcastle Mile.
Earl Of Mot set a new Australian trotters’ record of 1:56.2 with his win in the Special Olympics Trotters Mile taking .2 of a second off the 1:56.4 set by Knight Pistol at Bendigo in 1997.
Queensland mare Good Lookin Girl shattered the the Australian Mares’ Mile record of 1:54.6 run by WA mare Legendary Jac at Bunbury in 2003 with her 1:53.7 win in the Ladyship Mile.
A new Australian Record for a 3yo was set at the first Menangle meeting on 24th June when Vegas Bound ran the mile in 1:53.8 at just his second start in a race.
But not everything ran smoothly at the official opening meeting.
Menangle is about an hour outside Sydney and there is only one access road for the last 5km, that took most of the 15,764 racegoers at least 45 minutes to negotiate.
Driver Peter Rixon was fined $400 for going too slowly on the leader Loud N Clear in the first race.
Some wag suggested that he was stalling until the owners made it to the track.
