Community
11 June, 2025
Richmond Field Days celebrating 40 years
It'll be a big couple of days at the Richmond Racecourse.
Telecommunications, or a lack thereof, was the biggest talking point at last year’s Richmond Field Days, but president Nick Buick hopes that will be a thing of the past at this weekend’s event, starting tomorrow.
“Telstra won’t be any good, but luckily for us, Wi-Sky, which is run by our own local resident Will Harrington, has come on board to help out,” he said.
“He stepped in last year and saved the day after spending a couple of hours to set up something temporary when Telstra became completely unusable.
“This year, he’s been out at the racecourse over the past four weeks doing upgrades to our internet to get it to the point where we’ve now got a public wifi network to handle all of the exhibitors.”
This year is a special one for Mr Buick and his committee as the Richmond Field Days celebrates its 40th year.
After Friday’s action is done at the racecourse, locals, visitors and exhibitors will slip into more formal attire for a casino night at the Richmond Civic Centre.
“We wanted to mark 40 years, which we feel is a pretty massive achievement to have a show of this size run for that long by volunteers in a community the size of Richmond,” the president said.
“I think there are a lot of small communities that would love to have an event like this run for 40 years.
“We wanted to mark that occasion with something, so some of our team came up with this casino night idea on the Friday night.
“It’s going to be a way for us to recognise that this has been going for 40 years and give everyone that wants to go a night out.”
While the cost of living continues to impact local community events across the Outback, Mr Buick said he expected a good turnout at the Richmond Field Days on Friday, as well as the race meeting on Saturday afternoon.
“It’s all starting to bite but there’s a good feeling around. The field days always gets a great amount of support – it’s the biggest event that Richmond holds,” he said.
“Everyone gets the day off for it; it’s our show holiday.
“The other thing is, it’s so diverse, there’s something there for everyone.
“It’s an event where people can take the family and there is stuff for the kids, there’s stuff for mum, there’s stuff for dad. So it also ticks that box, which is great.”