The fledgling racing club at Orange have pulled off an amazing coup with top guns Hugh Bowman and Nash Rawiller set to make the trip west this Friday.

Orange has only just split from the Golden West Race Club joint venture they had with Bathurst, in fact this will be only their second meet since the breakup.

They were desperately seeking to gain some attention and they’ve certainly found that in the form of these riders.

There’s no feature event on the program and no carnival to speak of, just a set of $10,000 races made up of the local talent.

To their credit the riders have chosen to do this to help out the community as well as honour a promise or two made in the past as Bowman explains.

“I’ve always said that if I can go and help a club out, I’d be happy to do it, it is something that I can’t do too often because of our pretty busy schedules but I got a call and thought it would be a good thing to do,” Bowman said.

Ellie Brown heads up the Orange Race Club and says they’re looking to create a clear point of difference between themselves and some of the other country clubs.

“We are trying to run the race club like a business and show the local community that we are serious about racing … we are looking outside the box – and it is great to think that we have Hugh Bowman and Nash Rawiller riding at the meeting,” Brown said.

“We are hosting a tradeshow and we wanted to give the local businesses a reason to be a part of it all.”

In addition to that they’ve also chartered a helicopter specifically to fly Bowman and Rawiller to the meet.

Bowman may not have been to Orange for a while but he is defending quite a nice record at the venue which he established as a teenager.

“The first time I rode four winners in a meeting was at Orange,” he said.

“That was back when I was 18 and I haven’t been out there for a while.”

Rawiller also gained his start out in the country tracks of Victoria and says it’s fantastic to get a chance to give something back.

“Country racing is a lot of what the sport is about,” Rawiller said.

“I know how hard the people involved in country race clubs work so I’m more than happy to put my hand up and help out.”