Royal Randwick Racetrack reconstruction

Royal Randwick racetrack was re-constructed in the year 2001.

The construction project encompassed the entire main track of approx. 2.7km (includes chutes) with a width of 30m. The project being so large the track was broken up into a series of sections to be completed and then moving to the next.

The existing track had to be removed down to the base. This base then had to be shaped  (straights have a cross fall of 2.5% and the turns 5.0%) and consolidated at times using imported clay.

On completing this base (Engineering contractor), using the old peg and string method to achieve these levels the drainage system was then installed by Agripower.

The drainage layer consisting of ‘Blue metal’ to a depth of 100mm then had to be imported and levelled. On satisfactory completion of this layer (+/- 10mm),  topsoil had to then be recycled after initially being stockpiled in the centre of the complex, to a depth of 300mm (+/- 10mm).

The contractors for these two stages where McMahons and to achieve these accuracies with maximum speed and labour,  ‘Trimble’ GPS ( for the dozer) and TDS (for the 2 graders and land planes), survey equipment was used with the GPS using a ‘Base station’ to achieve the accuracy of 20mm.

The computers at this time could not handle large blocks of data and the racetrack 3D model had to be broken up into 200m sections with a 1m grid pattern. This modelling was carried out by Gary Thomas, now Yellow Box.

As the photos attached display various stages of the project and the turf machinery adapted.