The imminent return of bushfire smoke forced Canberra Racing to abandon a meeting at Thoroughbred Park.
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Racing officials made the decision to cancel Wednesday's meet that morning due to the poor air quality.
The ACT Emergency Services Agency was predicting more smoke to descend on the capital on Wednesday afternoon, with the air quality index expected to climb to hazardous levels.
The index at the Florey monitoring station in Canberra's north was at 327 at 8am. Readings above 200 are considered hazardous.
Meets at Braidwood, Sapphire Coast, Albury, Moruya and Gundagai have already been abandoned.
The by-product from the fires raging across the region has also prevented trainers in Canberra and Queanbeyan horses from training, while the abandoned meetings has limited racing opportunities.
Canberra-based trainer Luke Pepper had nominated Rosebank for the Maiden Plate (1300 metres) and promising filly Affinity Beyond in the Class One Handicap (1200 metres).
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He'll now send them to Wagga Wagga for a chance to race in Thursday's meet at Murrumbidgee Turf Club.
"Rosebank and Affinity Beyond were both due to run [on Wednesday], I used Wagga Wagga as a back-up plan because we were uncertain with racing at the moment," Pepper said.
"I've got a pretty good team going over there. I've got three really good chances, all horses are very well and ready to go.
"We're looking forward to it but we're a bit in the lap of the gods if it proceeds as well.
"We'll find out more in the morning and I'm really happy with the team I'm taking there."
The smoke haze hovering over the region has also put the Wagga Wagga meet in doubt. Officials will make a decision whether it proceeds before 7.30am on Thursday.
Depending on whether Wagga Wagga goes ahead, Pepper has also nominated in-form mare Gold Touch in the Handicap (1200 metres) and New Zealand horse It's Semi Sweet in the Maiden Handicap (1600 metres).
Canberra trainer Matthew Dale has six horses running on Thursday, while Nick Olive has nominated four and the Joseph Jones stable has five.
The loss of meetings has resulted in a bank up of trainers trying to find races, but Pepper says it's unforeseen territory for everyone.
"No one has seen anything like this, so we're all doing the best we can in this situation," Pepper said.
"We are missing racing and it has affected us in that way, but there's a lot of people including trainers down on the South Coast who have lost all their stables and stuff like that. You've got to look at the big picture.
"We're in a lap of the gods but at the end of the day I'm from Moruya and I've got a lot of friends on the coast who are doing it a lot tougher than us.
"It's been incredibly hard. Knowing trainers down there who have had to evacuate horses, lost stables, while people have lost houses and lives have been lost.
"That's the thing. We might be losing meetings here but at the end of the day the horses health and participants always come first."