Punters and patrons made the most of a warm and still autumn Easter weekend to attend Wimmera cup meetings at Stawell and Warracknabeal.

Both events attracted enthusiastic crowds as the region hummed to a return of major sport and community activities.

Stawell’s Stuart McGregor Stawell Gold Cup, which runs parallel to the Stawell Gift carnival, iced the cake for a big weekend of thoroughbred racing on Sunday.

Symon Wilde-trained Hard ’n’ Tough, with Wimmera jockey Dean Yendall in the saddle, won the 2000-metre feature event at Stawell, pocketing a $38,000 first prize of the $70,000 purse for connections.

Hard ’n’ Tough, $5.50, won by 1.5 lengths from Barry The Baptist with The Regiment third.

The action followed Warracknabeal Cup racing on Saturday, where trainers Ciaron Maher and David Eustace enjoyed success with six-year-old Reserve Street in the 1600-metre main event.

The gelding, with jockey Harry Coffey on board and starting at $6, won the Emmett’s-John Deere Warracknabeal Cup by 1.25 lengths from pre-race favourite Indispensable, trained by Paul Preusker, and the Dane Smith-trained Man from Uncle.

The Warracknabeal Cup, usually part of Warracknabeal district Y-Fest activities, carried $45,000 prizemoney overall with $24,750 for the winner.

The entire April 7, 2021 edition of The Weekly Advertiser is available online. READ IT HERE!