Several Victorian country race clubs have made submissions to have their courses ripped up and replaced with synthetic tracks following the success of the artificial surface at Geelong.Racing Victoria Limited (RVL) chief executive Rob Hines said there were "at least a half a dozen options" for the new synthetic track.He said a new track would need to be near the bulk of the horse population and be a training centre.He didn't rule out an inside synthetic track similar to the one at Geelong being

Several Victorian country race clubs have made submissions to have their courses ripped up and replaced with synthetic tracks following the success of the artificial surface at Geelong.

Racing Victoria Limited (RVL) chief executive Rob Hines said there were "at least a half a dozen options" for the new synthetic track.

He said a new track would need to be near the bulk of the horse population and be a training centre.

He didn't rule out an inside synthetic track similar to the one at Geelong being built at either Flemington or Caulfield, but the country option was for a synthetic track to replace the course proper.

"The key criteria is that it needs to be where we train horses and close to the horse population," Hines said.

"Depending on where we might put this second track, there may be only five or 10 meetings scheduled on the synthetic a year and it might be home for 10 to 20 transferred meetings as required.

"There are at least half a dozen options where this could go but we want a full size synthetic track."

A proposal for a new synthetic track would be submitted to the RVL board and infrastructure committee as early as next March.

Hines would not disclose which country clubs had expressed an interest in a synthetic track.

A review of the Geelong synthetic track found that overall performance of the track was "very good" for the 17 scheduled meetings in terms of turnover, field sizes and feedback from trainers and jockeys.

Turnover was 20 per cent higher than on the corresponding turf meetings a year earlier.

"The track provided an even surface, consistency of form and really encouraged punting," RVL's chief strategy officer Paul Bittar said.

He said there was a slightly higher than normal proportion of favourites winning and the pattern of racing suggested there was no track bias.

A preliminary veterinary review indicated that the rate of abnormal injury was lower for the Geelong synthetic track than other surfaces during the same period of racing in 2010.