The Mystique of Greyville Racecourse

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The Mystique of Greyville Racecourse

By Lane Payne
The Daily Party
September 21, 2020

Greyville Racecourse is a Thoroughbred race track in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The 2,800 metre pear-shaped track consists of several gradient features: it is run uphill from the 2,400 metre mark to the 1,800 metre mark, after which it slopes gently downward for approximately the next 800 metres then uphill again into the nearly flat 500 metre homestretch.

The track's infield holds the Royal Durban Golf Club's Championship golf course. Greyville Racecourse is host to the prestigious Durban July Handicap and in August, the Greyville Gold Cup, both Group One races that annually draw the best horses from around the country.

The history of horse racing in KwaZulu Natal goes back well over 150 years, with the first meeting held in July 1844, close to the sight of the present course. Greyville Racecourse celebrated its centenary in 1996, the Durban July was first held in 1897 with only seven horse competing.

King George VI, Queen Elizabeth and Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret visited in 1947. Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh also dropped by in 1995. The track staged South Africa's first-ever Sunday meeting in February 1996 and became the first to race under floodlights.