'It'll be quite a solemn and sad day' - Kranji hosts last day of racing in Singapore on Saturday

Kranji hosts its final meeting on Saturday, with around 10,000 racegoers expected to attend the last fixture in the Singapore Turf Club's (STC) 182-year history.

The ten-race card features 141 runners and is headlined by the 100th renewal of the Grand Singapore Gold Cup. The course, which was opened in 2000, will make way for redevelopment.

For their part, the Singapore Turf Club have decided to go out in style. Channelling their inner Taylor Swift, each race will focus on a different era in the STC's history.

"We want to celebrate this event with the rest of the world," said the Club's head of tracks R Jayaraju.

Local owner Eric Koh told Channel News Asia: "There'll be guests who will be very excited and will be out there for a fun day out. But to a lot of us – the trainers, the owners, the jockeys – it'll be quite a solemn and sad day. It's like attending a funeral really, because it's the last day of Singapore racing after 182 years.

"The reality has set in. We have all accepted that there's no U-turn and so we just have to move on."

All but six of the 22 local trainers have remained since the closure announcement was made last year. The 700-strong horse population at the time of the announcement has already been whittled down to 240 to avoid bottlenecking at quarantine, with the overwhelming majority ending up in Malaysia.

Founded in 1842 by Scottish merchant William Henry Macleod Read, the Singapore Turf Club started life as the Singapore Sporting Club (renamed in 1924) and was first located at Farrer Park. In 1933 the Club sold the original site and built the Bukit Timah Racecourse, which was visited by racing enthusiast Queen Elizabeth II on a state visit in 1972.

The Turf Club moved for a final time at the end of the last millennium, opening Kranji in 2000. The racecourse was used as a recovery facility for foreign workers during the global coronavirus outbreak.

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